The Next Step: No. 45, March 1984

next step bahtthe lories No 45 March 1984 review of the Revolutionary Communist Party Say Jobs and sa 20p Attack on abortion rights p5. 9000000

the

NEWS

Ireland No bans on Irish solidarity!

Their state, our rights 3 Speak out for Irish freedom!

Free the prisoners 4 Irish POWs 4 Sinn Fein leader in PTA arrest Women 5 Abortion: better late than never Racism 6 Repatriation and the right 6 Luton passport raids

FEATURES

Editorial A world we did not make 11 11 Farewell then Andropov Defend jobs and services!

12. As the Tories prepare their offensive against local government, Labour has already reconciled itself to the cuts. We look at where the axe will fall and outline our strategy for fighting back.

Women and revolution 16 Trotsky on women's liberation Reviews 20 From Chartism to Labourism Grenada: under the heel Inside black America 22 Letters 2 the next step, March 1984 next step No. 45 March 1984 monthly review of the Revolutionary Communist Party Publisher Junius Publications Ltd, BCM JPLTD, London WCIN 3XX.

Printer Morning Litho Printers Ltd (TU), 439 North Woolwich Road, Typesetting and design Junius Publications Ltd (TU).

Subscription rates (for 12 months) Britain and Ireland £5, Europe £8.50 Middle East and North Africa £10 America, Asia and Southern Africa £12 All cheques payable to Junius Publications. Circulation 01-274 3951.

Correspondence to The Editor, the next step, BCM JPLTD, London WCIN 3XX. ISSN 0144-350 X March 1984 6 Sari Squad goes to Europe 7 Black workers in the NHS Imperialism 8. Lebanon erupts Labour movement 10 10 Scott's bakery strike 10 Fight Ferranti Imperialism 18 Isolating the Irish War Police and people Middle class nightmare 23 Activities TAKING CONTROL outlines a strategy for reclaiming our unions and rebuilding them as effective fighting organisations

TAKING CONTROL

A handbook for trade union militants •8 El Salvador: Reagan's bloodbath Fight contractors and cuts GCHO: loyal servants 10 Strike for jobs, not Ford Apartheid expansionism

JUNIUS

memoration march from Sheffield.

ago British paratroopers stopped an anti-internment march in Derry by shooting dead 14 unarmed Irish- This year, men. stopped the march in memory of the 14 murdered on Bloody Sunday by asking the Home Office to ban it. Last November, Sinn Fein (Britain) called the 1984 Bloody Sunday march for 29 January in Sheffield. An organising committee supported by labour movement and Irish solidarity organisations booked Sheffield City Hall for a post-march rally. 17 December. to add to the general climate of anti-Irish bigotry whipped up by the media. national executive member David Blunkett gave in to the wave of hysteria and banned the rally from the City Hall.

On 4 January the council banned anybody supporting the fight for Irish freedom from their property. Three weeks later Blunkett joined Yorkshire South police chief Wright in applying to the Home Office for a ban on the march. Leon Brittan eagerly complied. Irish Freedom Movement and Sinn Fein supporters tried to move the march to Bradford. An all-party coalition of Tory, Labour and Liberal group leaders applied for a ban without consulting their councillors.

The march was barred from Bradford. A last minute attempt to reorganise the march in Chesterfield met a joint call for a ban from the local and North Derbyshire Labour councils. The Home Office slapped its third ban on the march. Chief constables usually have to cajole local authorities to agree to stop a dem- Yet in Sheffield onstration. it was the Labour council No bans on Irish solidarity! At the end of January, Home Secretary Leon Brittan banned the annual Bloody Sunday com- Twelve years Labour Sheffield's council Then came the IRA bomb at Harrods on Sheffield's Tory press seized on the march Sheffield council leader and Labour Party which put pressure on the police to go for a ban. Blunkett gave two reasons his action. for First he objected the to march organisers' refusal to condemn anti-imperialist violence. Second, Blunkett claimed the threatened National Front counter-demonstration could provoke a Neither riot. excuse justifies Blunkett's on democratic rights Sheffield Labour council objects to organisations which back the Irish liberation struggle and commemorate the dead of Bloody Sunday. Yet Blunkett has no qualms about opening council premises to the Tory Party, whose leaders presided the Derry -Ove Neither does Blunkett condemn antiimperialist that violence threatens powers other than Britain. On 20 January Sheffield Labour Party held council premises - at which Salva- 1FM in Sheffield: the state stopped us marching, but not from speaking out against British terror doran trade unionists took a of the collection in aid armed struggle against the US-backed dictatorship El Salvador. Sheffield council's ban was not prompted by an aversion to violence, but by the council's loyalty to the British state and hatred of those who fight British oppression.

The council's concern the National Front over demonstration was a weak effort to portray its grovthe British elling before radical establishment as anti-fascism. Fascist sects threaten attack the LO Bloody Sunday commemoration every year. Even when their opposition demonstrations have mater ialised, they have never suc the ceeded in disrupting march. A Labour council's ban achieved what the National Front can only dream of - silencing oppo sition to the Irish War. The opposition did not remain silent for long. On Saturday 28 January - the after the day bans were imposed - Yorkshire Irish Freedom Movement staged its regional Making sense of Ireland' conference in Shef field. The conference had been called as a focus for building the Bloody Sunday march. Instead, the 300 strong meeting became a launching pad for a campaign against the ban. The confer ence called a demonstration against bans on Irish solid.

and attacks the arity on democratic rights of free speech and assembly foı Saturday 3 March Sheffield The victims of Bloody Sunday died for the right to oppose oppression.

We will fight to defend that right.

Trish Freedom Movement

TROOPS OUT NOW.

SELF DETERVINATION

On the march: be there in Sheffield on 3 March!

SHEFFIELD CITY council tried to justify its ban on the Bloody Sunday march an attempt to stop In the fascist violence. 1930s, the National Council for Civil Liberties used the same argument to call for legislation to res- Yet trict demonstrations. the history of the 1936 Public Order Act - which was used to ban the Sheffield march

SHOWS

that state bans have always hit abour movement and left-wing demonstrations.

Order The Public Act introduced the was battles of

SUCCIN

between fascists and left- Under the wing workers. Act police forces outside London can ask their local to the council to apply Home Office for a ban on demonstrations. Police chiefs London can apply direct to Whitehall.

From the first, the Act was used to arrest antifascist demonstrators rather than Mosley's black- Over the past 20 shirts. years police have used the powers of proscription against peace campaigners, anti-imperialists, antiracists, workers - anybody who challenges the estabtishment. Those who break bans have faced mounted police baton charges. Occasional bans marches on right-wing have awavs heen turner against the left. 1960, a protest against rent rises Camden became a riot when police broke it up and slapped a three month ban on demonstrations in the area. In 1963, 1967 1970, and London protests against repression Preece were hanned and broken up. Police ell

CON

Their state, our rights added charges of riotous assembly and two Greek demonstrators were depor- Bans have been used ted. give a legal cover to police terror. In 1965, a protest against the Vietnam War banned from Was London's Grosvenor Square without warning. Police simply waded into the crowd and broke up Similar bans the march. brutality antiand Vietnam marches throughout the sixties. During the seventies, the left called on the state to restrict fascist marches.

Yet the real effect of state interference clashes between left and right was 1974 at Red shown in Lion Square and 1979 in Southall, when police baton charges killed antifascist demonstrators: first Kevin Gately, and then When police Blair Peach. complied with Labour councils requests to ban fascist marches, they made left did sure ine

HOT

Thus in February benefit. 1978, the Metropolitan Police applied for a ban on a National Front march in Ilford. The lett was jubilant - until it became clear that planned antifascist marches were also banned. If the police cannot use a council ban to suit their they will own purposes, ignore it. In October 1977, Tameside Council in Manchester applied to ban a fascist march. But police National allowed tront leader Martin Webster to march through Hyde in Tameside, while anti-fascist protests

SUNTE

were santed Irish solidarity marches have been frequent targets for state bans. The most ) Freedo significant is the permanent ban on Irish protests in Trafalgar Square the traditional venue London rallies. The Traf Square algar ban was imposed in February 1972, response to huge demonstration London protesting at the deaths on Bloody Sunday. Since 1972, the only event concerning Ireland allowed into Trafalgar Square was a rally staged by the propeace people' British in 1976. Police attacked antiimperialist counter-demonstrators, arresting 14. Annual Bloody Sunday commemorations have been threatened with bans on several occasions over 12 years. The the past march was banned from Coventry January 1982 after the National Front threatened a counterdemonstration. The organisers moved the march to Birmingham. Policeallowed a fascist gang to take over a roundabout and smoke. bomb coaches arriving for the march. People who break bans have sone arity been left in no doubt as to whose side the state is on.

During the 1981 hunger strike, the Home Secretary all slapped London marches. An Irish solidarity protest against Kilburn the ban in marched into a wall of riot police. Forty protesters The Shefwere arrested. field ban on the Bloody Sunday commemoration stands in this tradition of Whether state terror. by radical proposed Labour councils or police thugs, bans on demonstrations are used against who challenge those oppressIOn. THE SHEFFIELD BAN iS an attempt to suppress the rights of people who want to speak out against the British occupation Ireland. people pointing the finger at the real culprit for the casualties at Harrods and all the other victims of 14 years of war in Ireland the British state. There nothing new • about attacks our freedom to oppose British rule in Ireland. Former Irish prisoner of war Gerry McLaughlin of Sinn Fein opposed the ban one as state attack on the Irish people's democratic rights: 'Sinn Fein has been banned or illegal for most of its existence.

But we make it clear we'll be We'll Britain. marching ban and we'll oppose beat this ban." For ten years the of Irish - people rights living in Britain have been curtailed by the Prevention On the of Terrorism Act. that Sheffield same day "leader David counci Blunkett called for Leon Brittan to ban the Sinn Fein march, the new Prevention of Terrorism Bill passed its third reading in Parliament.

The Bill will become operative in mid-March when the old Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act expires. The new Bill makes permanent the existing ban on Irish people speaking out against Britain's occupation of their country. More than 5600 people have been detained under the provisions of the old PTA.

There will be thousands more detentions if we allow the new Bill to go unchallenged. But bans and draconian laws are more attack than an on supporters of Irish freedom.

Any restriction on democratic rights is a blow against the working class, against women, against blacks, against peace campaigners, against any section of society which needs to protest and organise against It is vital that the system. we mobilise the widest possible resistance to any state bans on meetings and demonstrations. Support for the march has come flooding in from all quarters.

Joan Maynard, Sheffield MP and veteran leader of the Labour left was one of the march first to the against the bans. Maynard is president of the Labour Committee on Ireland and Speak out for Irish freedom! Irish Freedom The Movement demonstration in Sheffield on 3 March has won broad support for the campaign: Sheffield Against - Labour council's ban on Irish meetings and demonstrations Tories' Against The new Prevention of Terrorism Bill has long been involved in Labour Party initiatives around the war. She spon- Yorkshire Irish sored the Freedom Movement's *Making sense of Ireland conference in January and spoke out then against the bans in Sheffield Clare Short, the recently elected Birmingham MP with strong family connections in South Armagh, soon added her the support for march. Short was a member of the Labour Party delegation to the Six Counties last Gerry summer that met Adams and other Sinn Fein leaders. Jeremy Corbyn has built up a reputation for campaigning in solidarity with the peoples of Ireland and Central America since he was elected MP for Islington last June. He is no stranger to bans on Irish meetings.

Only a fortnight before the Bloody Sunday ban Corbyn travelled to Grays in Essex for a debate on Ireland with the Irish Freedom Movement.

When a crowd of 30 fascist from thugs, bussed in London, attempted to disrupt the meeting they were kept out by IFM supporters.

The local police chief used this as a pretext to cancel the debate, despite protests from Corbyn and others at While plans the meeting. went ahead to reconvene the debate in Grays, Corbyn gave full backing the march against the bans in Sheffield Other MPs who ga ve support their included Southall representative Syd Bidwell and Liverpool's Bob Parry, a prominent supporter of local Irish Freedom Movement initiatives against the use of the Prevention Terrorism Act in the city. Other Labour MPs were not forthcoming. Martin SO Flannery, MP for a marginal Sheffield constituency, declined and front bench

MARCH AGAINST BANS ON IRISH SOLIDARITY!

SHEFFIELD 3 MARCH

Assemble: Caborn Corner, Carlisle Street (Spital Hill) Sheffield, 1 pm Transport details — see page 24 spokesman Clive Soley Tony equivocated Benn was too preoccupied trying to become an MP in Chesterfield to take a stand against the suppression cratic rights in the area.

Ken Livingstone in to

WTOLE

declare his approval for the the bans. against Livingstone emphasised the link between the GLC's Tory campaign against attempts to curtail democratic rights at local government level and the protests against bans and proscripon Irish solidarity tions activity. There was widespread backing for the Sheffield demonstration on similar grounds from Labour who councillors meT Nottingham after a week the Bloody Sunday ban to discuss strategy against rate capping and cuts. Some 40 councillors signed up support of the march, taking total of councillors against the bans past 60. In Bradford where the Labour split in heated group debate over the original ban more than a dozen councillors backed the March demonstration. Local Militant leader and prospective MP Pat Wall spoke out against the Peter Hain, bans. to Labour leader adviser Kinnock Neil and figure prominent In une radical Labour Coordinating Committee, backed the Sheffield protest. Freedom The Irish Movement appealed to a wide range of which would also be affected by any further restrictions on rights to organise Indications of and protest. support came from women's groups, international solidarity organisations, ethnic minority movements and campaigns. Kwame TaCt (formerly Stokeley Ture Carmichael), the black rights campaigner recently expel led from Britain for urging British blacks to organise to fight back, called from the USA to give his backing to the march against the bans.

As we go to press the list of march sponsors is growing fast mobilise the biggest possible demonstration in Sheffield on 3 March: We must show the council and the Government that we will fight any to restrict our democratic rights to speak out in solidarity with the Irish people - or any other ground people who are down by the British state Be there! the next step, March 1984 3

Free the prisoners Ireland Last month Sinn Fein Britain. national organiser in Ireland. war campaign? deserves much wider recognition.

appalling treatment in the spread support in the nationalist community. Here the prisoners are isolated in the prisons and public opinion strongly against them. What we are saying in our campaign is that Trish political prisoners are freedom fighters, not psychopaths.

What do you hope to achieve? We want our prisoners to be treated as what they are prisoners The oi war only they are in prisons in Britain is because Britain is at war in Ireland.

They nad the courage to fight in the most difficult conditions behind Lines in England itself and they have been punished by long sentences terrible conditions. In a way the Brits recognise their special political status by the way they them making them *category A', putting them solitary, moving them around all the time. Our demands are that they recognise the rights of our prisoners as prisoners of war.

We want an end to the illtreatment and the right to repatriation - so that Irish political prisoners can serve their time in Ireland. The lot 4 the next step, March 1984 For as long as British forces have occupied Ireland there have been Irish political prisoners in British jails Marx and Engels supported the Fenian prisoners, we support republican POWs today. Letter from Brixton jail - page 23.

councillor Alex Maskey launched a republican prisoners of war campaign in He spoke to Irish Freedom Movement Keith Tompson about Irish political prisoners and about recent developments WHAT ARE THE aims of the republican prisoners of The plight of Irish political prisoners in British jails In Britain they are branded as mad and evil men and women and they get prisons. Though conditions in Long Kesh are bad enough, at least our prisoners there have a sense of being in it all together, and they have wide- How is Britain respond. ing to Sinn Fein's electoral advance? We've recently come through a series of attempts to criminalise the struggle supergrasses the were the latest. But our electoral gains first during the hunger strikes in 1981, then in the Assembly elections in 1982 last year's general election have dispelled the myth that the republican struggle has no Britain now has to support. OUr

COUNCEANE

popular resistance in Ireland.

What has 1t to do recently is to bolster up the that lorces could counteract Sinn Fein. Witness the recent statements by James Prior has called on nationalist people to vote How is the SDLP trying to come to terms with Sinn Fein's success? The SLP leaders found themselves in a situation where, after a number of years in which they had no public opposition, they had become complacent. Now they find that Sinn Fein is getting support because the OLFM New video* majority of the nationalist people do not want Britain our country. So when Maggie Thatcher the Duke of Edinburgh come to visit the UDR barracks in Armagh where soldiers have been charged with sectarian murders - they have anti-Brit make noises. However, by doing that they are creating problems for themselves because they also to reach some WaRe accommodation with the Loyalists. Will the outcome of the New Ireland Forum help the SDLP? Although it's difficult to predict the exact outcome of the Forum it is obvious that the British would like to see the SDLP as the main voice of nationalist opinion in the North. They can get on well with a docile force that will in no way attempt to bring about the removal British troops OT or even raise the question of Britain's occupation of our country.

The SDLP refused to campaign against plastic bullets to support the hunger strikers, so obviously it's in Britain's interest to have a strong SDLP. The Forum is a part of that bolsteringup process. What do you think about the bans on Irish marches in Britain? Of course we are used to British bans virtually all marches, apart from Orange parades, in Northern Ireland are illegal. This is obviously something you have got to fight. If democracy means anything people have got to stand up for free speech on Ireland.

AIC

At present 54 Irish politicai prisoners are serving total of nearly one thou.

sand years in sentences in British jails. Of these 41 are recognised as freedom fighters captured in the course of military activity against the British state. The remaining 13 have been framed and falsely convicted charges arising

SURA

from bombings at Guildford and Woolwich and on the M62 motorway. Irish political prisoners receive special treatment in British jails. All but a handful are category prisoners, high kept security prisons. Many are also assigned to the special "category AE' those thought likely to attempt to escape - and subjected higher security. even Irish prisoners have also been detained special control units at Gartree Leading London Sinn Fein activist Jan Taylor was pıcked up under the Prevention of Terrorism Act just before Christmas. He told his story to the next step.

I had been out selling republican literature Friday night. When I got back five Special Branch men were waiting at my flat.

They had a search warrant for explosives. Was obvious from the lack of equipment for detecting explosives - for instance no dogs and the way they searched the flat, without removing the floor boards, that they weren't really interested in explosives. They seemed interested to Sinn Fein literconfiscate ature, correspondence, cheque books, lists of prisoners and anything else that might give inforthem mation. had been stopped about a month previously on my way to the Sinn Fein Ard Fheis in Dublin. I was asked to sign a green card.

CON

POW campaign launched: Sinn Fein councillor Alex Maskey with former prisoner Gerry McLaughlin Irish political prisoners and Wakefield where deprivation Sensory

LECI

niques used. Some have spent years on end in solitary confinement. Irish prisoners moved regularly from one prison to another to inconvenience visiting relatives and prevent them organising with other pris Nevertheless Irish prisoners have been at the centre of revolts at Wormwood Scrubs, Hull and Albany prisons. Five Irish political prisoners Michael Gaughan, Frank Stagg, Noel Jenkinson, Giuseppe Conlon and Sean O'Connell - have died at the hands of their British jailers. One prisoner who has been particularly harshly treated is Patrick Hackett.

Despite having lost an arm and a leg in a premature explosion. Hackett refused PTA arrest On this I put an old address and within seconds they queried it after referring to the computer and discovering that I didn't live there I then gave them anymore. my new address 'Anyway they searched my place for about two hours and bundled up everything they wanted. They then said I was being arrested under the

PTA

for membership of an illegal organisation, funding an illegal organisation, and for acts of terrorism that have happened or were about to happen. The six interrogation sessions through indicated that they more interested WEre finding about other people I know, than pursuing the charges I was arrested for. Of course I refused to answer any questions of that kind. When returned to work three days after appearing in court suspended. Management said were frightened

0CU9C

TEE

for two years to wear a prison uniform, wearing a blanket instead. Although his physical condition has recently deteriorated, the authorities have refused to allow him proper medical attention. The republican prison- , ers of campaign demands • the right to repatriation for all republican prisoners of war • the release of prisoners wrongly convicted • an the use of che to control units and solitary confinement •the release of Patrick Hackett on medical grounds • the repeal of the Preven tion of Terrorism Act. Support the prisoners demands and the regular prison pickets! Details from the Irish Freedom Movement, 01-274 3951. with me and SO they would suspend me until my redundancy came think it's very important that we give maximum publicity and protest about this sort of intimidation. If we are prevented from selling Sinn Fein calenders the next step will be to stop us selling our Republican paper News. This, together with the ban on our Bloody Sunday commemoration in Sheffield, Bradford and Chesterfield, gives the distinct impression that there is an attempt to drive Sinn Fein off the streets of Britain and away from its contacts with the Irish community. It was significant that while I was inside they asked what I thought would be the consequences of banning Sinn Fein. It seems that the government is looking for Fein ways ban Sinn

E-TO

They seem to be testing our strength."

Better late than never and the threat to introduce further legal curbs on abortion rights are part of a broader offensive to make women pay the price for the recession.

renewed attack on abortion rights - and abortion facilities - also exposes the collapse of the broad coalition of medical, trade union and feminist forces which successfully held off restrictive legislation in the seventies. LATE ABORTIONS have become the subject of national debate at a convenient moment for the British establishment.

Proposals for rights fit in with the new climate of reactionary morality which aims to ratify and reinforce women's inferior position in society. service authorities for whom cuts in abortion facilities are a convenient way of making the savings demanded by reduced government budgets. The church -backed anti-abortion lobby has seized on the late abortion issue in a renewed onslaught on women's rights Last of zealots group y car one succeeded in getting a gynaecologist charged with the attempted murder of a baby born alive after late He was acquitted, abortion. but the propaganda campaign has continued and intensified. Now the antiabortionists are pressing for measures to reduce the legal time limit for abortion from the 28th to the 24th week of pregnancy, or even earlier.

Last month a top committee of gynaecologists and paediatricians, the doctors most closely involved in the where are mer now. dooron t The propaganda campaign against late abortions The further restrictions on women's abortion Tighter controls on abortion also suit health care of women and babies, announced that was seriously considering supporting a 24 week limit Doctors' of approval tighter legal curbs on abortion has been justified by advances in medical technol- It has been widely ogy. the media that argued in improvements in neonatal intensive care have made the babies born survival prematurely after only 24 weeks of pregnancy commonplace The argument is spurious (see box). Exaggerated claims for medical are being used technology to justify doctors' acquiescence to the anti-abortion lobby. Since last year's court

WANDS

TRAIT

EVERY

CHILD

AWANTED

CHILD

ain under duack out te oia camed Abortion doctors have Case Could under intense pressure from the anti-abortion groups Life and Spuc, both of which have a substantial medical membership. The anti-abortion groups have encouraged nurses and other staff to inform on consultants who perform late abortions, threatening further trials and adverse publicity. As a result the British Medical Association's ethical committee Is no w considering a 24 week limit.

The publication last month of a national study Late abortion in England and Wales gave the antiabortion campaigners another opportunity to push their case for restriction. Yet the report exposed the fact that the late abortion issue is a pretext for curbing abortion rights. It revealed that late abomons make up only a tiny proportion of the total.

The most recent statistics show that out of a total of 167 797 abortions performed in England and Wales 1982 102, only or 0.06 per cent, were carried out after 24 weeks. Less than per around 3000, were done after 20 weeks The report examined the reasons for late abortions.

In around a fifth of cases performed was

BOR

because of a serious abnormality in the baby which only be diagnosed after 20 weeks. In another fifth of cases the delay resulted from the inefficient of the NHS. procedures More delays resulted from understandable indecision and procrastination, espec- Still ially in teenagers. more were caused by failures to recognise pregnancy at an early stage. For as long as all these problems remain unresolved, facilities for late indispenabortion remain sable for women. While the lobby for restricting rights to abortion in law gathers strength, NHS Technofraud The bionic baby remains a science fiction fantasy. Techniques of fertilisation have been perfected to produce human embryos from sperm and ova in test tubes. Methods of nurturing babies have made some advances in saving premature infants. Yet the technological barriers to

SES

taining a potential human being in any other place woman's womb between a week and six months after fertilisation remain enormous. The effect of higher standards of neonatal care has been to give babies born after 28 weeks of pregnancy a better chance. The mortality rate and the incidence of serious handicaps such as cerebral palsy, epilepsy, mental retardation and deafness babies among born after 28 weeks have been significantly reduced by modern techniques. Before 28 weeks both mortality and the incidence cuts are already denying abortion rights in practice Over the past 10 years the proportion of abortions performed in the private sector has climbed steadily as NHS facilities have deteriorated Since 1978 most abortions have been done privately. Every round of hospital cuts hits abortion The latest

STOVISORS

measures in East London example for threaten to close the area's only day care abortion service at Mile End Hospital.

Collapsing coalition The mounting offensive against abortion rights has yet to come up against any effective resistance. In the seventies a series of measures restrict abortion the White (1975), Benyon (1977), and Corrie (1979) Bills met concerted doctors opposition from the official organisations, movement and the labour Well women's movement. coordinated campaigns, including parliamentary lobbying and mass demonstrations, were successful in preventing the Bills from being passed At that time it was a matter of defending -the 1967 the status quo Act which allowed abortion under certain conditions against the anti-abortion Today extremists the of has climate opinion changed and so has the balance of forces. In 1984 the establishment has become much sympathetic to demands to curtail abortion rights. Conditions of deepening recesof handicap remain very high. Before 26 weeks the outlook is grim, even ir the best centres. Science provides justification 118 for an earlier limit than 28 weeks. Anti-abortionists constantly proclaim their commitment to the sanctity of the life of the They are unborn child. not at all concerned about the impact of the cuts on the quality of life of babies who have been born of neo recent survey natal intensive care found a nationwide shortfall of 60 per cent in the recommended number of cots, with only third of centres having a full establishment of nursing staff.

The moralists" interest in technology extends only as far they can use it to justify abortion rights. CurDs on They are not concerned with making the best technology available for all babies who need it. sion require woman in the role of mother, shouldering the burdens of a shrinking There is less welfare state. for demand women's services on the labour market the than there was when 1967 Abortion Act offered women a degree of independence from family life. The that defeated coalition White, Benyon and Corrie has disintegrated The doctors are still concerned the

OL COCIVE

professional control over access to abortion which the 1967 Act conferred upon them. But they are sympathetic to the Governoffensive ment's broad and against womer receptive to making NHS economies in the sphere of facilities They abortion have signalled their willing ness to compromise on so long as abortion rights, their status and income are not compromised. In 1979 the leaders of the

TUC

Women were sufficiently concerned to secure the affiliation of to the unions to organise a national demonstration in support of abort- Today the union ion rights. leaders are much too preoccupied with securing their own survival to pursue the cause of women's rights. The women's movement too has largely abandoned the fight for abortion rights.

the seventies feminist arguments remained on the moral terms dictated by the anti-abortion campaigners. Catholics asserted the right of the foetus to life, teminists asserted a woman's right to choose. So long as the adversaries of the women's movement were merely Tories and relig right-wing ious tanaties moralism wa sufficient. However, over the past couple of years the weaknesses of the feminist approach have been exposed.

From within the women's movement particular interest groups have challenged the feminist commitment abortion. Black feminists have questioned the use of abortion - • and sterilisation — as a device for controlling the black population. Disabled feminists have protested about the discrimination against the disabled implicit in aborting abnormal foetuses. Outside the women's movement the antiabortion forces have stead ily gained ground. Internally divided and confronted Government, the by the

•NHS

of the management and the medical profession, the feminist campaigns to defend abortion rights have fragmented and collapsed.

No choice For working class women abortion has never been a of morality question choice. The endless philosophical debates about the moment life begins, or the stage of pregnancy at which the foetus becomes viable irrelevant are

THOS

Nor is abortion women. simply a matter of individual choice for women workers as it may be for middle class The fact is that pregnancy and childbirth can be a disaster for a working class woman, leading to loss of income or even a job.

Abortion is thus an essential safeguard of women's right participate in society. Abortion is a necessity not an optional extra. Defending abortion rights in 1984 means taking on the Our fightback system. against the current offensive must begin by mobilising for working class support free abortion on demand Women can't afford anything less and all workers have an interest in defending both legal them against attacks and spending cuts.

Anne Burton the next step, March 1984 5

Racism

'ENOCH POWELL LASHES QUEEN'

'REPATRIATION - TORIES SAY YES'

'TORY EXTREMISTS EXPOSED'

'KWAME TOURE BANNED FROM BRITAIN'

IN RECENT WEEKS the front-page headlines in the daily newspapers have heralded a mounting ideological offensive against Britain's black community.

lines the Tory government has been turning the screw on thousands of black families.

being applied more stringently and black workers are under increasing pressure to vacate their jobs.

in Luton, below) were on a scale unprecedented in recent years. The wholesale intimidation ot indicates the direction in which the Home Office is moving.

Many Labour Party supporters expressed outrage at immigration minister David Waddington's recent proposals for repatriating blacks.

In fact, the Home Office was making only a minor adjustment to the repatriation provisions which have been in force for more than 12 years under section 29 of the 1971 Immigration Act.

These provisions, which allocated small of sums money immigrants returning home, have never been challenged by any Labour MP. Few black people have *% Afia Begum and her daughter Asma continue to defy them. They have been in hiding for over a year.

Lane office. British government. The delegation will be led by the Sar To join the tấp contact The Afia Begum Campaign Against Deportations. c/o Box 22 136 Kingsland High St London E8 Topics include • migrant workers in Europe and the USA beating the immigration police For full details write now to: WC1N 3XX, or phone 01-274 3951 6 the next step, March 1984 Repatriation and the right And behind the head- The immigration rules are The passport raids Bradford and Birmingham in mid-January (see Asian community Luton S accepted the repatriation handouts: only 142 218 in 1981 1980, and around 150 in 1982. The total amount handed out in 1982 was £101 000. Waddington's proposals aim to relax the conditions for access to this money. poor employment record and 'failure settle in TO Britain' is no longer a necessary qualification for a free ticket home. The previous earnings limit of £5 above supplementary benefit level been raised to £20 nas above the official breadline.

Sari Squad goes to Europe This month the campaign opens a new centre in Brick Lene, near the burnt out house where Afia Begum's husband was killed in a fire. It will officially open on Thursday 8 March International Woren& Day Asian women like Jyoti Raithathe who has just been refused permission to stay in Britain, are already receiving legel and proctical help from the Brick The Ala Begum Campaign israpidly extending its work, encouraging other deportation victims to fight the immigration laws, y But Its first priority to to win Afia's ease, supporters are travelfing to the European Court at Strasbourg to increase the pressure on the who have been inyolved in militant action on Afia's behalf. They will be meeting up with immigrant organisations in France and Germany and plan to address the Euro-Parliament Phone or drop in to the cam 114a (top floor) Brick Lane London E1. Tel 01-274 2820/247 7841

WORKERS AGAINST RACISM

NATIONAL

ANTI-DEPORTATIONS WORKING CONFERENCE

LONDON

26-27 May 1984 WORKERS AGAINST RACISM is convening a weekend-long conference for • everyone active in the fight against deportations and the immigration laws.

National and international speakers will address a wide range of workshops.

workplace organisation against raids and race checks • plus training sessions on the law and the media, debates and entertainment Workers Against Racism (Anti-deportations conference), BM WAR, London, These 'improved terms' are to attract hardly likely flood of applications. The behind real intennon Home Office proposals is to hostility fuel against foreigners. Powell-Proctor The Government has been assisted in its anti-immigrant crusade by the periodic outbursts of Tory backwoods- Harvey Proctor's calls men. for more extreme repatriation measures and Enoch Powell's vigorous defence of the British nation have promoted a climate which the Tories can win widespread public approval for their racist measures.

the same time, the Governbeen careful to ment has distance itself the Irom extreme right's more outproposals. Concerned to preserve the Conservative image as the party of the whole British nation, Waddington spoke out Proctor's against Harvey repatriation motion at the 1983 Tory Party conference.

Similarly, when veteran Enoch Powell repatriator reprimanded the Queen for me Office attempts to deport In May, Squad, & group of Asian women Return of the repatriator: Enoch Powell hits the headlines again showing more concern for the 'vociferous minority of newcomers' than for the 'great mass of her subjects, the Government maintained a respectable silence. But there was clearly a groundswell of support for Powell's bid to reopen public discussion on immigration, the issue over which he was sacked from Edward Heath's 1968 Shadow Cabinet. Waddington could probably get by without Powell and Proctor, but they perform a useful service for the Government in whipping up anti-immigrant prejudices.

There is no doubt that Government has been the toughening up on its approach to immigration, particularly from the Indian subcontinent. Only 100 'primary immig rants' - people with no sponsoring relatives Britain passed through Heathrow from the Indian subcontinent in 1982. For those with sponsors, the rejection rate rose from 30 in 1981 to cent

OCE

probable 40 percent last Nearly 1500 people year. were deported in 1982, and some 1000 illegal entrants' were held in detention in such Ashtord Prisons Remand Centre pending depottation. One indication of the increasing intransigence of the Home Office towards appeals compassionate grounds was its

ACCOR

refusal to allow the Pereira tamily to remain in Britain.

The Pereiras are an Indian family living in a Tory village in Hampshire. The whole village has pleaded with the Home Office to let family stay. Backing from bishops, letters to the Queen and extensive press coverage have all proved unsuccessful. The Home Office has still refused to budge. Not the problem While the Tories have been cracking down OH immigration, the Labour Party has been conducting a sideline debate the extent of fascist infiltration in the Tory Party. After the recent Young Conservatives extreme rightwing infiltration, the Labour Party has been looking for fascists under Tory bed every obvious that the right has increased its strength in the Conservative Party since the last election.

But the Tory backwoodsmen are not the problem the Tories' consistent antiimmigration policies are. Yet rather than challenge the Government's vicious attacks on blacks, Labour MPs have gleefully seized every opportunity to raise the fascist bogey. Bradford Labour MP Max Madden recently brought the House down when he accused Harvey Proctor of being a "fascist toe-rag' (Hansard, 25 He would have January). been better employed building labour movement resistance to the recent spate of Home Office deportations.

The Tory strategy on race is not much different from Labour's. This is most apparent at the legislative level where the 1981 Nationality Act is in a direct line of from succession Labour's 1979 draft Bill. But even at local government level, there is not much to choose between The Tories have emphasised their commitment to uphold the interests of the British nation blacks included. In some areas with a large black pop ulation, they have even managed to make gains at Labour's expense. In Brent, north London, the Tories gained control of The real meaning behind the Home Office's 'voluntary repatriation' schemes became clear to Luton's black community •when police squads swooped on their homes in the early hours of 17 January. For the next three days and nights dozens of Asian families were terrorised by Scotland Yard's illegal immigration unit. Up to 200 officers were involved in more than 60 Mohammed Rashir homes. Police ransacked Asian homes and disrupted local businesses. At least 200 people were questioned at Luton police station • only three were charged. One woman who is eight months pregnant was detained in a police cen lor lo nours delore she was released without charge. The pretext for the raids Luton was to crack down on an extensive the black coln ci

WEPT

councillor Ambrozine Neil defected from Labour. • The new chair of Brent's race relations committee IS black Tory, Sam Greenaway After a recent trip to Tory- Bradford, run Greenaway said that his visit 'confirmed my belief that good race relations is a vital part of Conservative philosophy Clearly, at time when the Tories are making headway against the Labour Party in places such as Brent, they are unlikely to adopt Enoch Powell and Harvey Proctor as their spokesmen.

Behind the public assurmaintaining about good Tories are stepping up their offensive against the black community. The passport described raids in Luton, below, are just one example.

As long they as can maintain a social consensus for their viciously antiworking class measures, the Tories will keep the Neanderthals confined to their caves. Gareth Evans Luton swoop passport-forging racket' operated by local community leaders. Deputy Superintendent Thomson Smith of Scotland Yard's immigration squad confirmed later that the raids were part of a wide-ranging "illegals' inquiry into initiated September in Similar raids took 1983. place in other parts of the including Brad. country, ford and Birmingham Luton community worker Mohammed told Rashid Workers Against Racism: Every corner of the house was searched and possessions were smashed up. The Assoc iation's offices were raided by Scotland Yard after I rang up to find out the whereabouts of some. community leaders They gave the impression we were, a group of passport forgers. One policewoman asked where the were being forged.' The Luton raids were the biggest operation carried out by the immig ration police for years. Their object was to intim idate and harass the Asian community, and to provoke public hysteria about "illegal immigrants'. Until the labour mobilises its forces against the state's racist offensive, blacks can expect more of the same. Farekh Afzal

Stop the sackings! Black workers are getting the boot from Britain's NHS hospitals. Health minister Norman Fowler recently announced that 1000 overseas doctors must go home next Overseas year. student nurses are being refused the work permits they need to complete their training. At the lowest end of the NHS hierarchy privatisation of ancillary services like catering, cleaning and laundries means mass redundancies and deportations - for black hospital workers. Pranesh Das and Pam Lawrence report. 'HOME OF THE Cockney' *Renowned for its warmth That was and friendliness'. the alluring description on

NHS

an recruitment brochure for the Newham School of Nursing London's East End. Distributed to prospective students in Malaysia, the leaflet guaranteed 'further professional education for qualified staff. Things turned out differently for the Malaysian nurses who qualified in Newham last March. They were refused work permits required to complete their final six months of practical experience. Without the permits all their training is worthless. Their job prospects will be nil, whether in Britain or back home. The Newham nurses are not exceptional victims of private education

SOILIC

racket. The NHS has been conning overseas student Most come nurses for years. to Britain to qualify as SRNs (State Registered Nurses) but are instead pressurised SENs (State to train as Enrolled Nurses). This is a shorter course which costs the Government much less, but qualification 1t which is not recognised in most of the countries from which the students come. Whatever their qualifications, overseas nurses often end up in the least popular specialities, like geriatrics or mental illness. *Every time I go for a job interview, they ask to see my passport. Asian doctor at Selly Oak Hospital, Birmingham. Fewer black and fewer doctors today even get that far. As one East London doctor, Mark Ponnampalam, put it racism is really fashionable now hospital appointments committees. If your name sounds black, it goes straight in the waste bin'. Back in 1979 the General Medical Council ruled that First to go: black nurses get the deportation treatment Now things have gone one step further. More and more overseas nurses are not even getting the chance to complete their training. They are being refused the transfer from student to work permit status which they need to stay in Britain.

Bleeding hearts • West Midlands Regional Health Authority has just admitted that its equal opportunities policy is a complete flop. Only three blacks bothered to answer its latest round of adverts for administrative jobs. spokesman compramed that black people's aspirshould be higher. anons We blame the Health Authority. It may have had an equal opportunities policy since 1975, but it has been cutting jobs and services for much longer.

As a result, black health workers' have

PLUSUCCES

At least one nurses' home in Bloomsbury, attached to London's University College Hospital, is closing as More result. and more overseas student nurses in London are having central to pack up and leave. All a far cry from the this -is sixties when health minister Enoch Powell

TECT COR

workers for the NHS from Britain's former colonies.

When the welfare state established was after the Sending them back overseas doctors would only get permanent registration if, after five years, they had found senior registrar jobs.

The problem for Britain's overseas doctors is that the vast majority are stuck in positions,

THOSE NOT

with no hope of promotion.

means at least 1000 That will have to go when the GMC ruling becomes operative next February. The DHSS has recently discovered, in a report produced in with

COLL LILLION

the British Medical Assoc- Black workers in NHS Second World War, it was well understood what role play. immigration "Who else', asked future Labour leader James Callaghan in 1946, "is going to pay for the old age pensions and social services unless we have an addition to

LOUI

never been lower. These days the major health all unions run "racial awareness' courses, and issue glossy brochures to their officers on race But things look relations. different on the ground. *The union never tells us anything' is the view of Asian women domestics, at Warneford General Hospital Leamington. *We're in COSE but they never produce anything in our language. And union meetings are held at night cooking for WelC our families. population, which only immigration can provide in the years to come?' Nowhere was this clearer than in the NHS. By 1948, the year the NHS was founded, selection committees for the foreign recruitment health workers had already been set up in 16 countries.

Duty free The policy open door continued right through the fifties and sixties. Doctors, and nurses were iation, that at present growth will have rates the nos 20 000 too many doctors by the year 2000. This widely publicised figure just happens to be the same as of overwe total number doctors in Scas

CHECHE

Britain. Scare stories about 'incompetent" overseas doctors working in deputising services and failing language tests all help to create climate conducive to kicking them out of the NHS and out of the country.

from gènerally exempted the entry restrictions in the 1962 Commonwealth Immigration Act. They were automatically classified as possessing skills likely to useful in this country and granted entry vouchers.

Ancillary workers also continued to come in large The

NHS

numbers. made an exception to the general restrictions on unskilled labour. Special work permit quotas were issued under the provisions of the Aliens Acts. Filipinos expelled The subsequent treatment of Filipino workers in the NHS sums up the changes in immigration policy since the mid-seventies. Since the of the 1971 enforcement Immigration Act, fewer and fewer work permits have unskilled been to The annual NHS workers. quota for resident domestics and nursing auxiliaries was cut from 2500 in 1976 to 500 in 1979, and has since been reduced to zero. • A 1978 Department of Employment circular stipulated that applications for unskilled NHS work permits would in future be from only accepted European nationals. In the same year a Filipino woman who had lived in Britain for five years applied to bring her children over.

This proved a big mistake.

Home Office decided she should never have been let in at all, accusing her of misleading immigration of officials about the ages children. More than her 400 Filipinos have since and been deported thousands more pressurised into leaving. The mass expulsion of migrant workers from the NHS is already well underway. The Home Office aboutturn on immigration is not difficult to explain. For under decades, Tory or Labour administrations, there was little choice about recruitment policy in the NHS. he sheer scale of the service and its labourintensive character meant that keeping down wage a number

COSES

objective. This was particularly true in the ancillary sector, which expanded by 53 per cent from 1949 to 1974 and despite cuts still know all about work I came to this permits. Morocco in •trom

COULLY

1967, on 'Category C employment voucher. worked in restaurants and hotels, washing dishes, shifting carcasses I got this job lousiest jobs. in 1971'. Abdesalm Sabar is the GMBATU Branch Secretary at St Mary's hospital, in He works as a Paddington. Like many pastry cook. migrant workers in the NHS he knows what it's like to be an illegal. *The permits tie you down to one employer. I had to run away from mine to get another job. At St Mary's the entire catering staft bar two are black or overseas workers.

It's the same in the laundry and amongst the domestics.

There are no promotion prospects. Abdesalm has been stuck in a Grade 6 job for years, despite going on training courses and making endless applications for a more responsible post. There is a lot of racial tension at work. A newly appointed white Head Chef insists on calling all blacks bastards' and "lazy asking constitutes more than

NHS

third of the total workforce. The best way to keep labour costs down is by employing large numbers of workers who are prepared to work unsocial hours in poor conditions, for low pay. Privatisation strikes Now the Government has decided that cutting the

NHS

bill is wages not The Tories' privatenough. isation plans are the culmination of a long series attempts to reduce costs in the health service. Privatisation will hit black workers disproportionately because the sectors they are concentrated in - catering, cleaning, laundries - will be the first to go. A recent survey in London hospital one found that privatisation will mean the loss of a third of all jobs, nearly all of them Filipino In the past, NHS administrators could not find sufficient white workers to fill many ancillary jobs. As late as November 1982 immigration minister David Waddington admitted that a reduc tion in the number of per- Sessions on •racism in the NHS • black workers in the motor industry •raids, race checks, deportations Write for credentials (£1.50/£1.00 UB 40) to: London, WC1N 3XX, or phone 01-274 3951.

Racism Broken eggs 18910 15 16 Abdesalm Sabar Abdesalm why he doesn't go home — 'no jobs in your country?'. Recently the dispute got physical, when the white chef attacked him and threw a box of eggs into his office. union Abdesalm points out that without collusion from management his assailant would never have got away with such conduct.

Abdesalm used to be a Nupe member. Once, after he had been off sick, management demanded to see his passport. They wanted proof that he had not been He refused, and abroad. complained to his union. The response? He was told there was nothing be done - this was 'not a union matter'. mits issued would not result in an equivalent saving of jobs for the resident labour force'. But things are changing fast. Large scale job cuts, not just natural wastage, underway. are Fear of unemployment is driving a wedge between different groups of health In the last five workers. 155 hospitals have y edis closed down; 10 082 beds have disappeared. Over the last six months nearly 5000 NHS jobs have gone. The Government has officially now sanctioned the victimisation and deportation of black hospital workers. Health service authorities are hoping that NHS trade unionists will indifferent to the expulsion of thousands of black workers from their Anti-racists in the

NHS

must stand their ground Act now to stop destroying a united fightback against the cuts!

DEFEND every health workers' right to a job RESIST passport checks and withdrawals of work permits INSIST on union backing for workers facing deportation.

WORKERS AGAINST RACISM

WEST MIDLANDS TRADE UNION CONFERENCE

SAT 24 MARCH 10-5 pm plus evening social at Koco Ltd (Coop Centre) Unit 15 The Arches Industrial Estate Spon End Coventry Pam Lawrence, Workers Against Racism, BM WAR, the next step, March 1984 7

Imperialism Whoever wins the elections in El Salvador this month, the chances of Ronald Reagan winning his election in November will depend on how far he can avoid direct military intervention against the advancing anti-imperialist America. troops would attempt to regain control in Nicaragua; this year the question is whether they will have to invade to keep control in El Salvador.

*It's basically a pretty good record' Secretary of State George recent 'human rights" performance of the El Salvador dictatorship. sternly admonished the regime over the murderous activities of its semi-official death squads.

the killings and threatened cuts in US aid unless the slaughter stopped. accused of murdering US citizens and called for the deportation of 20 named assassins.

of killing two American union organisers and a Salvadoran land reform official. Three more army officers were posted to embassies abroad. And the death toll for December declined to 25 (from 56 in November). The final 1983 body count stood at 5500 *Pretty good' said Schultz.

Vicious Meanwhile Major Roberto D'Aubuisson, the godfather Salvador's death squads, is a front runner in the country's sham General 25 Election scheduled for March. Not for the first time, the authorities have temporarily restrained the of ViCiOUS aspect

THOSE

imperialist rule in El Salva- The wanton barbarities

GOT.

of the death squads have been a source international embarrassment for the rulers of El Salvador and their American sponsors. Liberal opinion abroad has been upset by the murder of 30 000 50 000 SOle radicals, trade unionists and ordinary and wOrKers peasants. over the past four years of civil war. Concern has turned to outrage since the carnage extenaca to a handful of American advisers and missionaries in El Salvador. A more serious problem for the Reagan Mexico Belize Guatemala El Salvador! 8 the next step, March 1984 Reagan's bloodbath forces Central in Last year debate centred on whether US commented US February on the Schultz in Last December Reagan's deputy George Bush He demanded a curb on Washington demanded trials of Salvadorans The result was that one man - Captain Eduardo Alfonso Avila - was jailed on charges administration is that the killings have only provoked more resistance from the masses. Back in 1981 an American commentator observed that state terror was effective in suppressing popular revolt: The brutal killings by the army victims sawed in halt or placed alive in battery acid have succeeded in traumatising the Salvadoran people into fearful passivity. Yet, despite three more of brutal killings, y CaLs Cuba Honduras Nicaragua there is little sign of passivity among the Salvadoran people today. In recent months workers have taken over the People's Democratic Union which was originally set up by the American trade unions and financed by the

CIA.

The old leadership was kicked out and the union led a wave of strikes by state employees which the capital San brought standstill. Salvador to The new union leaders pubtheir licly declared sympathies for the underground guerrilla movement against Far from regime. the cowing the masses the death squads are driving more and more people to support the liberation struggle. Last year the rebels the Farabundo Marti National Caught in the crossfire: anti-imperialist forces advance in El Salvador Liberation movement killed more than 7000 government They now control troops. around a third of the

COUS LEY.

The prominence of Major D'Aubuisson in Salvadoran politics the

TCLICCLS

regime's dependence on the Their clanaedunsyudds destine activities may appall diplomatic visitors, foreign correspondents and Western liberals. They may drive some Salvadorans to ioin or support the guerrillas. But essential to the they are of a dictatorship Survival which lacks base of The popular support regime's conscript army is notoriously lacking in commitment and performance, despite enormous US efforts training LO equipment. The death squads on the other hand represent precise and extremely effective political instrument in the hands of the ruthless senior officers and influential civilians who direct them against all rival contenders for power' - in the words of a recent British D'Aubnewspaper account. and the Reagan uisson administration - appreciate that terror is the only thing that can sustain the rule of the Salvadoran military junta over its impoverished To and disaffected people. appease liberal critics Shultz withdrawal of the multinational peacekeeping force from Lebanon is a severe setback for Western diplomacy' (The Times, February 1984). We welcome any setback for Western diplomacy. The removal of the multinational forces from Beirut represents a step forward for the people of Lebanon.

But the imperialists have not given up, yet. The British force merely scuttled back to Cyprus, still within striking distance of Lebanon. The American marines have moved on to US fleet off the Lebanese coast. The warmongers are not out of action yet. On Sunday 5 February US President Reagan told listeners to his weekly slot national radio that on 'support for the Lebanese government is broadening among the different groups.

And our efforts to strengthen the Lebanese army and its ability to keep the eagerly accepted some token gestures of atonement from the regime. And Reagthe an followed recent advice of Henry Kissinger and stepped up handouts of cash and weaponry to the butchers of El Salvador. Resistance The recent success of the guerrillas in El Salvador and setbacks to US-backed counter-revolutionary forces in neighbouring Nicaragua have provoked further indirect US military intervention, not only in El Salvador, but also in Honduras and Guatemala. In Honduras the USA has embarked on three major military construction projects (two munitions storage dumps and a 'troop facility') worth $8.7m. It has prolonged manoeuvres along the Nicaraguan border for as long as five years. The Reagan administration has authorised the supply of helicopter $2m parts worth Guatemala, breaking an embargo on military sales imposed in 1977 because of the regime's genocidal internal repression To contain the rising anu imperialist movements of Central America the USA is and more becoming more directly involved in turning the whole region into battlefield. Lebanon erupts US marines: out of sight, but still in action peace are making sure and steady progress. days later, after crisis talks with top generals in Washington and panic transatlantic phone calls to the of France, govenients Britain and Italy, Reagan a television appeared In broadcast to announce he had ordered the redeployment of US marines out of the and on American war fleet stationed off the Lebanese coast.

he At ordered the reinforcement of the fleet and gave the USS New Jersey tions to fire will on nationalist positions But Beirut's hinterland. bombardment of positions outside the city resolve the military struggle in Beirut. The collapse Lebanese within hours of Reagan's first broadcast, and the outbreak of civil war in Beirut signalled the end of US attempts to build broad based government that the contain disorder in Lebanon with US military support. The resignation of Muslim Shaffiq Minister Prime Wazzan and the nine-man Lebanese Cabinet was the cue for the army to split.

Within two days nationalist militias, aided by deserters from the army, had liberated West and South Beirut.

President Amin Gemayel, last year 'Duke of Beirut, found his Duchy reduced grounds of the •The The elections in El Salvador are a fraud designed provide a democratic facade for imperialist coercion. D'Aubuisson's far right Nationalist Republican Alliance (Arena) faces the conservative Christian Democratic Party's Jose Napoleon Duarte and the reactionary National Conciliation Party of Francisco Guerrero. To register as a political party it is necessary to submit 3000 signatures to the authorities. For anybody to the left of the far right this would mean signing their own death warrant. Thus the election IS nO contested by the real opposition in El Salvador. As in the last election in 1982 this month's poll will be marked by enforced voting government controlled areas Presidential Palace. Army units loyal to the minority Maronite Christian regime joined Christian Phalangist guerrillas. Gemayel - and with him America's along hopes for a political settle ment in Lebanon - were The conflict marginalised. has become a direct confrontation between imperialism and the Leb. of The maintenance imperialist peace in Leb.

anon demands an orgy of military repression. More than a century of imperialist control has forced the Lebanese people to fight back against the misery imposed on them by foreign armies. The imper ialists need peace in the area to prevent the struggle against imperialism spreading to more vital areas of the Middle East. Their Iranian obsession with in Lebanon expresses their fear that the Lebanese civil war will set the whole region in the only turmoil. But peace they can bring to Lebanon is the peace of the wilderness. The only hope for real peace in Lebanon the defeat of imperialism The only for in the hope peace Third World is the destruction of imperialism by the masses in the Third World and the working class in countries The imperialist That is why we say: Hands off Lebanon! Victory to the Lebanese people! and boycotts in areas held by guerrillas. D'Aubuisson observed election early in the campaign that military victory is the only way the regime can prevail over the guerrilla movement. Whether or not D'Aubuisson wins the election, Reagan will have to make sure the Salvadoran ruling class wins the war.

The problem facing Reagan is that given the weakness of the regime and the growing strength of the guerrillas, he might have the send marines in to achieve this objective. In election year at home, that could prove a very costly project Reagan may yet be dragged into the bloodbath his administration has created in Central America. John Johnson

Fight contractors and cuts In the February issue of the next step confidential trade union documents exposed union complicity in NHS cuts.

Below, Mick Hume reports on a recent strike against privat- Kent. isation in demonstrates that even militant anti-privatisation campaigns sacrifice privileges. first in the country to put its entire domestic services out to tender, putting 300 jobs at risk.

mitted tenders for the contract which starts at the end of this month. ive Health Care Services. Medway's NHS managers entered the fray with in-house tenders for cleaning the six hospitals involved. working conditions than the private bids.

utives appealed to health service unions to back their tender. Left-wing Nupe area official Nick Bradley declared that he wanted 'nothing to do with it" because it accepted the principle of cuts. Backed by sympathetic Labour Party members on the health authority, Bradley started a campaign to "keep contractors out' and maintain the existing worktorce Striking back In November Bradley took the unprecedented step of calling a strike against privatisation at All Saints Hospital Sixty seven in CHalan. organised in Nupe and Cohse came out. Around 20 of them were quickly forced back work by to Poached or scrambled? Events at Medway highlighted the fact that the 14 the NHS TUC unions in are more interested in fighting each other tor membership dues than fighting Despite privatisation. offered concessions by Nupe and Cohse, the Excl contractors refused to recognise them and cooked up a sweetheart deal with the TGWU exclusive rights to organise for union complicity in Exclusive's attacks wages and working conditions. There's a lot of it about.

Cohse's Last October Welsh section noted with disquiet that contractors were sulening up closed shop agreements with the TGWU, the GMBATU and Usdaw at Cohse and Nupe's However, Cohse expense. admitted, to be totally fair' to the poaching unions, recognised them *in rather selective way as can be seen from the appalling pay and conditions (even NHS, standards) that by these contractors give to their employees'. To be totally fair to Cohse and Nupe, all the unions are prepared to waive worker's and employment pay rights if it helps them get one up on their rivals in the recruitment stakes. Health workers desperately need organisations to unite them across union lines. The experience of workers in Medway workers' interests to defend union bureaucrats' Last year Medway District Health Authority became the Five private firms sub- The front runner was a new company, Exclus- These allowed for less dramatic cuts in hours and The NHS execfamily pressures. But 45 women stayed out for more They were than a month. on the picket line outside the All Saints morgue every day, they raised funds in the local labour movement and staged demonstration through Chatham town centre. he women were desper. ate to save their jobs. Many of them relied on their miserable wages as their only source of income. Yet the strike stayed under the Nupe officials' control. As document about Nupe Medway produced in December made clear, union's left-wing officials were as much concerned to preserve their status in the health service's Whitley Militant NHS shop stewards at Canterbury are fighting for an independent organisation oppose privatisation and

CULS.

face union officials They who want to stick to the life District quiet on the Joint Staffs Consultative Committee, where they sit alongside non-TUC scab unions and listen to management's plans for attacking their members. full-timers have ine stressed the need for *pragmatic approach' to fighting privatisation. What this means was well documented in a paper on called *The privatisation trade union approach' recently put by

BULE

neighbouring Eastbourne's Joint union committee: The unions have trade always supported reasonable efforts to achieve the most effective and efficient use of resources and have accepted an obligation to cooperate with management respect. We believe most strongly that there are other better ways to ensure value for money than starting down the road to privatisation.'

While the bureaucrats searen for ways to attack workers which will allow them to cooperate with management in this, NHS militants in Canterbury are getting their campaign to save jobs and services under way. machinery as consultation fight they were to That's why they sold

CULS

the strikers short. The Nupe document, Public Need not Private Greed*, correctly identified *a tendering crude mechanism for competition' which the bidder 'with the greatest willingness to cut staffing levels and reduce staff employment conditions' wins the contract. But Nupe's concern for its members welfare was more than matched by its desperation maintain the existing management/ system of consultation. This system of collaboration had been established through control of health serstate vices and was threatened by privatisation. The document warned that privatisation held out a prospect of very poor industrial relations in the future. It proposed that all tenders should be rejected Medway District and that Authority should Health 'managers and appoint - as specified supervisors in-house tender' the to *run and maintain the existing level of directlyemployed domestic services' 'No alternative' Nupe was opposed to the in-house tender's cuts. But the union's primary concern was to ensure that domestic services remained 'directlyemployed' So that union officials could keep then places on the state's Whitley consultation bodies. The inallowed for house this. To get the in-house tender's proposed management structures agreed, the bureaucrats were willing to go along with its proposed attack on the workforce. Shortly before the health authority met in December to decide which tender to accept, Nupe and Cose gave a commitment to make the in-house tender's harsh conditions work. This invol ved a cut of around 500 hours in the cleaning time at All Saints, and a similar cut at the district's other hospitals. It promised shorter hours, harder work and less pay for the women cleaners still on strike. But, declaring that they had 'no alternative, Nupe officials were prepared to go along with it to save their own positions.

No contest Once Nupe officials the had accepted the principle of tendering, they had lost the battle against privatisation. They were now backing an attempt to outbid the privateers. The argument had shifted from one about whether there should be cuts in working hours, to one about how big the accepted cuts should be.

Nupe originally had predicted, the health authconsidered meeting

OTTE

the bids on their commercial Exclusive's bid to merits. slash cleaning hours by 929 - almost double the in-house

MEDWAY TOU

TRA CONSE

Marching for jobs in Medway tender's savings carried the day at All Saints. The company won contracts at three other Medway hospitals. The

LWO

cleaning contracts were won by in-house tenders Rather than step up the industrial action against the cuts, Nupe continued to back-track in the hope of something through saving negotiation. The strike at All Saints was called off just before Christmas. In-house cuts With their strike action scuttled by union manoeuvres, the All Saints cleaners now face a vicious attack. They have all been re-interviewed by Exclusive. The company has refused to announce how many will be made redundant, but up to 173 jobs are at risk in the district. It is clear that cuts in working hours will mean full-time domend to estics at All Saints and speed-ups and wage cuts for One materthe part-timers. nity unit has had its allotted cleaning hours slashed from Workers' 234 to just 69. benefits will be rights to Cleaners who hammered. previously qualified for six full months pay and Six months half pay while sick, will now get only four weeks full money and four weeks half. This is the reality of privatisation in the Yet health service. the cleaners at the two Medway hospitals which won their for in-house tenders Case with union support are not much better off. The December health authority meeting awarded cleaning contracts at the Med way and St Barts hospitals to in-house bids.

All As at Saints, workers' officials used militancy to argue for maintaining state management of domestic services. well Med way hospital is

COU

known for militant action.

It played a leading role in the 1982 NHS pay dispute.

The Nupe branch chairman threatened the health authwith a repeat of this ority action if it tried to privatise cleaning at Medway. The authority conceded and let the in-house tender through The bureaucrats were well pleased with their successful defence of state managethe ment and access allows them to the decisionmaking process. Cleaners at Medway can be less pleased at the way their militant traditions were exploited to save the bureaucrats status at their expense. The in-house contract involved We need to withdraw our representatives from • all state agencies introducing cuts - especially regional and district health authorities • all permanent negotiating bodies in the Whitley system We need to reject • cuts in any form - natural wastage, voluntary redundancies, 'temporary' ward closures, and hospital schemes whether private or in-house that reduce jobs, pay or conditions • collaboration with cuts: this includes the role of union members in drawing up tenders and specificat- Central London, New Cavendish Street.

phone 01-274 3951 Labour movement cuts of up to 500 hours and radical changes in working practices The Medway experience underlines two points. First, that health workers are prepared to take strike action defend their jobs Second, that the most leftwing officials are ready to hold back such action and accept cuts to defend their position. Militant

O WI

health workers like the All Saints cleaners can take on the contractors and the cuts and win, if they reject the bureaucrats' approach and fight with the politics outlined in our health workers charter below. ions, and of union representatives in negotiating over them We need to set up • workplace committees of health workers representing all sections of the workforce • union committees at district and regional levels consisting of lay representatives, not full-time officials We need to fight • to maintain jobs and services • for a living wage for all NHS workers @ tor unions that are united, accountable, and effective

PREPARING FOR

POWER IN 1984

We will be holding our week-long summer school this year from 13 July to 20 July at the Polytechnic of For more information, send a stamped addressed envelope to: Kate Marshall, BM RCP London WIN 3XX or the next step, March 1984 9

Loyal servants Labour movement On 25 January Foreign Secretary announced that civil servants at the Government Communications Headquarters in Cheltenham had a month to give up their union cards and join a scab staff association, or collect their insurance cards and join the dole queue. Those who left their union would get a £1000 handout.

who wanted to stay in both a job and a union faced forcible transfer to other departments. The Government claimed unions at Cheltenham were a threat to national security.

The unions insisted they were not. The real threat to the security of workers' jobs and rights never became an issue.

and policemen as the only state employees debarred from union membership and rights. Union organisation is now at risk in other "sensitive" there throughout the state sector.

20 000 Around angry civil servants took spontaneous strike action in response Howe's announcement. They closed 128 social security offices and hit several government depart- While ments. struck against the attack on their organisations, establishpoliticians and press ment Governprotested the at from ments's departure Tory normal procedure. members of the Commons select committee and Times editorials accepted the need to prevent strikes at the spy But they thought Cole be this should through a gentlemen's agreement with the unions rather than through Howe's rough- The civil neck approach. leaders service union agreed. Insult Civil service union and Labour Party spokesmen denounced the Cheltenham ban as an insult to GCHQ workers' patriotic creden- Civil and Public Sertials. chief vice Association Alastair Graham was incensed at this 'monstrous 29 January On Sunday

TGWU.

negotiator Ron Ford Todd told 7000 workers to postpone action closure of the against the at Ford's hames toundry Dagenham plant until he talked to Ford bosses about their long-term investment Over the past 10 plans. years unions at Fords have tied workers' pay and jobs to the state of Ford's profit and investment accounts. Since the recession hit Ford's profits, the unions have responsibility for accepted keeping the company They have acceppetitive. ted 7000 redundancies at Dagenham in return for Their plan to investment. fight the foundry closure follows this pattern of collaborating with management.

A Joint Coordinating Committee leaflet at Dagenham set out three reasons why it may be necessary to strike to save the foundry: *The need to strike is not for The pay but for investment. need to strike is not to damage Fords but to ensure its future The need to

AND YOURS.

strike is not to save someone 10 the next step, March 1984 Sir Geoffrey • Howe Those The Cheltenham ban ranks GCHQ workers with soldiers security departments, and from slur the trade union

OIL

movement: *The First and Second World Wars would not have been won without the cooperation of the trade union movement. MP Dennis Labour lett Skinner tried to taunt the Tories by pointing out that the average British traitor came from the playing fields of Eton Cambridge or a rather than a shop college The stewards' committee. unions claimed the ban on membership at GCHQ was a response to American pressure to quell opposition to the use of polygraph detectors in vetting security staff. CPSA journal Red Tape complained at the Thatcher way Margaret *obligingly crushes British that 'another unions SO feature of the American Way of Life can be imposed on our society.

No strikes, we're British The labour movement's patriotic posturing crippled its opposition to Tory union- The only effective busting. response to the ban would Strike for jobselse's job but to save your own."

The unions see workers? and bosses' interests as the They have become Sarase. integrated into the management machinery, one as militant body plant explained: When there are any disturbances on the production line we're taken the bosses' rooms where the committee stewards, not the management, are giving us the Secure threat of Japanese cars coming into Britain. They tell us tc work harder and produce more.'

RCP

supporters inside and outside the Dagenham plant have argued that Ford workers must break off all links with management productivity schemes and quality evaluations. Profits and competitiveness the bosses' problems, ale not ours. Our concerns are We need to jobs and wages. reject discussion of Ford's future investment strategy, and start organising against their job-cutting tactics today. That means all-out defend the action to foundry jobs at Dagenham.

have been all-out action to disrupt key government departments. sponine walkouts - LaECOUS potential for showed the But the this to succeed. union leaders avowed commitment to defending the made hitting state

GCHQ

nerve-centres like with strike action out of the Civil Service question. Union leader John Sheldon explained that it was 'not an issue for industrial action' because. *Geoffrey Howe will only jump up and say we're threatening national security. The CPSA's Alastair Graham told his members that 'above all we must do nothing which undermines public support for our stance and asked them only to send telegrams to the Government. He withdrew the February issue of Red Tape for fear that its banner headline "It's fascism Thatcher style would upset sympathisers such as Cheltenham's Tory MP. When the Tories claimed that past industrial action at GCHQ had threatened the security of the realm, the unions issued a long statement to prove how ineffective their action had been.

The agenda for the civil service unions' day of action did not 28 February include strike action. Secure our jobs The union leaders had no hope of defeating the Gov- They merely wanted to convince the Tories to talk to them. As we go to press, the union bureaucrats are locked in secret talks with the Tories. Margaret Thatcher seems unlikely to save the unions place at the negotiating table by swapping a no-strike agree- But even ment for a ban. if she concedes, the effect will be the same for workers in the civil service. The bureaucrats got one thing right: the ban on unions at GCHQ raises far broader issues than those of It illusunionism. trade trates the dangers of nationalism in the working class.

The British labour movement unable to will be defend workers' jobs and rights against state attacks, if it remains committed to defending the British state against foreign aggressors. Union leaders' patriotic kow-towing to the state has already 10 000 cost civil service jobs, with another 30 000 threatened, and wrecked recent pay cam- January's paigns. action by 20000 disgusted showed that servants workers have the power to action take independent What they against the state. need to succeed is a political outlook which rejects notions of national security and concentrates securing a better deal for workers. Paul Foster

ALL

RICH

NION

DEFEN

Uncivil servants: Cheltenham workers demand their rights For the past two months,

RCP

supporters Liverpool have been backing the strike against by 400 redundancies the Thomas Scott bakery in the city, a of Associated subsidiary British Foods. In February Scott's management upped the planned sackings from 70 to 200 and threatened to shut the bakery down if the workers didn't concede. mass At a meeting all but three of the Scott's workers voted to stay out. Be case day that the bosses formally closed the bakery, the national executive of the • bakers' moved to keep control of the strike.

It announced a ballot for the end of February on dispute to extending the 57 all the company's plants throughout Britain.

Scott's workers have already seen how ineffective the union's solidarity action can be. On a recent trip to win support from bakeries, Cardiff they discovered that the Welsh workers had not even been told about the Liverpool Since 1970 Ferranti Engineering Holdings in Chadderton, Manchester has slashed its workforce from 3000 to Now the bosses plan 300. to close the plant altogether and keep on just 30 workers.

RCP

supporters have been down at the factory arguing for action. Ferranti's bosses want men and machinery out of the factory as fast and with as little fuss possible. They have set the closure date for the end of April offered workers 12 and weeks redundancy money. Their union - the AUEW seems more concerned with arguing the toss over redundancy terms than with redundancies. fighting the Convenor Paul Gibson discussed redundancy pay with

4CHQ

SECURE EFEND

OuRRiCHTS RIGHTS NO GC Solidarity with Scotts Bread line picket une: corts workers light or The Scott's strike. workers have now taken the job of winning solidarity into their own hands.

They are organising from gations to plants Glasgow to London. This RCP sup. is the strategy argued for porters have the of the from dispute. Fight Ferranti the bosses, but was loath to call a mass meeting to disaction with the

CUSS

workforce. workers know Ferranti there are no other jobs to be had in their depressed area.

Some have expressed a willfight, but ingness to are unenthused by the AUEW's approach: One worker summed up their frustration: "The steward told us to carry on working normally until we got our notice. Then they had section meetings - 10 blokes here, dozen there, useless. The unions should be stopping the machines going out but they can't stand up to management.

They came from management's office and read us the terms and said they're trying to improve on that. they never mentioned trying to fight the closure."

DEFEND

COMPROTISE

OUR

UNIONS

- UNION

COMPROMISE

ANAr GCHQ!

LOURRICHTS.

THREAT

STAND

cryn

BAKER

As we go to press the bosses have begun to move plant out of the factory The union has undermined solidarity by refusing to sponsor delegations around Yet the strike the country. Send messages continues. of support to 64 Priory Road, Anfield, Liverpool 4. factory has The recently been mysteriously decorated. The union needs RCP supa new look too. porters' bulletins at Ferranti's argued for an immediate mass meeting to let workers decide what action to take We called on the workers to their representatives stop discussing redundancy terms and start organising to fight sackings. Despite the positive reaction from many workers, the union responsplitting the ded by up workforce into further We section meetings fighting for still las. file Rank and meetings. for control is essential action to throw out the who are discontractors mantling machinery.

Aworld we did not make Farewell then Andropov abour's shattering defeat in the last General Election hasinduced a prolonged sense of alarm and even panic in the official labour movement. No sooner were the votes counted than the 'agonising reappraisal" was under way. Calls for a 'major rethink' were in fact demands for an orderly retreat. When TUC leader Len Murray stated last August that full employment was not necessarily desirable, it became clear that every principle of trade unionism was up for sale.

The new realism that pervades the inner circles of the labour bureaucracy is coherently codified in the TUC's draft policy document Strategy for the future.

This document argues for a new sort of union movement, one that represents not the interests of workers, but all sides of industry: Unions have to demonstrate that they represent the views and interests of employees.

And employers, and governments, have to take note of unions because they are the vehicle for winning the consent of individuals as workers for policies employers and governments wish to pursue and that need the cooperation of workers if they are to succeed.

The TUC's new definition of trade unions as vehicles for winning the consent of individuals as workers for policies employers and governments wish to pursue' is far removed from the objectives of the workers who founded the unions to fight for their own interests against the employers. It is further removed than ever from the Marxist view, which insists that only a consistent struggle through the unions for working class interests.

regardless of the consequences for employers and their state, can yield positive results. The new realism of the leaders of the Labour Party and the TUC means that they have thrown in the towel without a fight. The class struggle has been reduced over which of the to a squabble employers' options should be accepted.

At the Government's GCHQ spy centre at Cheltenham, the unions are prepared to give up the right to strike to preserve the W hen Leonid Brezhnev died in November 1982 the pundits of the West proclaimed the end of an era. It wasn't. In the aftermath of Yuri Andropov's funeral and Konstantin Chernenko's accession, only the most naive commentators are holding out the prospect of change in the Soviet Union. Andropov was portrayed as a man of considerable intellectual power with an ability to speak forthrightly on sensitive issues. It was often forgotten that Andropov's statements simply reflected the views of a Soviet bureaucracy that had come around to the recognition that something had got to change.

Even the most conservative generals realised that the Soviet Union's economic decline was irreversible and that urgent steps were required to stop the rot.

What distinguished Andropov and his the facade of trade unionism. In shipbuilding, union officials are ignoring the problem of mass redundancies, while raising hell about which private capitalist should take over the shipyards. In the hospitals and in local government the union bosses have instructed their members to participate in in-house tenders, and compete with private contractors instead of fighting for jobs. The list of concessions is endless.

T he new realism is not only defeatist - it has a corrosive effect. by the labour leaders further undermines the will to fight.

months, trade union and Labour Party dignitaries have abandoned even the pretence of taking on the Tories over issues that matter to workers. Gone are the days when even right-wing union bureaucrats felt the need to make speeches about unemployed. Militant MPs sit in silence as the Labour leadership betrays the four million out of work, occasionally trying to save face by asking ineffectual parliamentary questions about YTS schemes. For the labour bureaucracy, the new realism expresses profound political paralysis.

For the working class it promises a future of despair. The official leadership of the labour movement has no solutions. For the time being it does not even pretend to have anything to offer working people. Both inside and outside Parliament, the Labour Party has been reduced to pointing out ways and means of slowing down or cushioning the impact of the capitalist offensive. even oppose the Tories - instead it cheers on Tory dissidents who dare to question the wisdom Instead of exposing Thatcher's policies, the opposition seeks solace in the occasional scandal or minor backbench revolt, and prays for more banana skins under ministerial feet. The Parliamentary Labour Party from Dennis Skinner to Peter Shore is united in the hope that colleagues from their predecessors was that they were less secure and therefore more open to new options. However the bureaucracy can countenance neither of the two real options facing Soviet society.

These are to revert to the capitalist market, or to establish a planned economy under the dictatorship of the proletariat. the end of bureaucratic privilege and the destruction of the bureaucracy as a distinct stratum. Andropov was in every sense a man of the bureaucracy. emphasised was a more systematic application of 'discipline' and official recognition of the power of the market in restricted areas of the economy.

authorities claimed that tightening up labour discipline was yielding results: output statistics registered improvements in 1983. next step longer fool anybody. activists, Every concession made working class. In recent cannot afford. *fighting for the distant future. Today even the two artificial issues. that the stakes are high.

the next. The Labour opposition cannot of government policy. increases could Soviet economy.

CCOHOLY

Both options would mean echoed the preoccupations predecessor. The policy that he two views on this. material losses, The damage." some But the modest some misdemeanour by Mark Thatcher might distract attention from their abject failure to put up any political resistance to his mother and her government.

its leaders The very fact that every meeting or conference of Labour activists ends with a call for a 'rethink' or a 'fresh approach' indicates the scope of their problem.

Labour's traditional solutions have been discredited and cosmetic changes will no Half-hearted attempts to defend local government and save the NHS can barely inspire Labour never mind galvanise the The Labour leaders' current malaise may well turn out to be a temporary phase. No doubt with the passing of time they will formulate new solutions.

But time is a luxury that the working class The devastation of the capitalist crisis has got to be fought in the here and now, not postponed to the The working class has no need to find The problems we face are all too real. To overcome the recession the capitalist class is moving towards a solution that requires the destruction of the working class as we know it and quite possibly, through another world war, the destruction of society as we know it. The threat of catastrophe means Every stand taken by workers is now met by court injunctions and police violence, by the tomorrow concentrated power of the capitalist class.

From the Police Bill to the Employment Bill to the Prevention of Terrorism Bill every right is under question. The latest anti-working class law is only a prelude to fight. n Britain in 1984 the conflict between the classes pervades every dispute. This conflict may be ignored but it will not go away. To ignore the class struggle is simply to accept defeat in advance.

Class conflict cannot be postponed to the future - whether we like it or not it is the problem of today. At present the the old. not obscure the persistence of the structural crisis of the Even before his death Andropov's discipline campaign had come to a standstill. Coercion and exhortation have only limited value in improving the performance of a modern industrial Chernenko's speech on his acceptance of the post of General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party of his The question of organisation, order is a key, principled one for us. There can be no Any slackness, irresponsibility brings to society not only They inflict serious moral Like Andropov before him Chernenko is forced to reduce the crisis of Soviet society to subjective problems.

As contest is a very uneven one The working class is weighed down by obsolete institutions and demoralised by Above all it does not have its own strategy. Until now the working class has been held accountable to a world not of its Instead of waging a own making. campaign for our class interests, the trade unions have proposed consultations about saving 'our' industry and 'our' services The independent role of the working class has effectively been surrendered over decades of collaboration. In the past, economic expansion allowed the labour movement to escape the consequences ol class collaboration. The recession shows the disastrous outcome of our loss of class independence. Without our own strategy even the boldest leaders and the most resolute resistance cannot prevent defeat.

That's why the Revolutionary Communist Party proposes a strategy of consolidating forces through demarcating the interests of our class from theirs, on every issue.

Our day to day struggles will be dissipated if we do not clearly define our long term objectives.

Nothing less than the destruction of the capitalist system of exploitation and oppression can create the preconditions for the liberation of humanity. Nothing less is realistic for those on the dole today, for those who will be made redundant and for those whose exploitation will be intensified to meet capital's unquenchable thirst for profits.

The recession poses a stark choice that We can accept their cannot be evaded. terms of enslavement or stand up and We can withdraw every time an employer announces more redundancies, every time the Government demands the surrender of more union rights or the courts issue another injunction. Or we can fight for our jobs and our rights, our Which class will dignity and our class. prevail? This is the question we are posed history. It imposes responsibility on those committed to making a new world out of the ruins of bureaucrats they are more at home with giving orders, tightening the screw and blaming failures on their subordinates, than explaining the crisis of the Soviet system. It is a sign of the times that such subjective and anti-materialist rhetoric can be taken as having even the remotest connection with Marxism and Leninism.

The Soviet bureaucracy has profound differences with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. But it is also an enemy of the international working class.

Despite his humble origins, Chernenko his active achieved power through the destruction of involvement in working class power in the Soviet Union.

The working class in the Soviet Union and abroad sheds no tears for Andropov.

This former head of the secret police died of natural causes. The destruction of the will require the Soviet bureaucracy revolutionary energy of Soviet workers.

the next step, March 1984 11

199

URE

The character of the Tory attack on local government jobs and services reveals the Government's recognition of the drastic measures necessary to get British capitalism out of recession.

The outraged response from Tory councillors and some Tory backbenchers, from the Labour Party and the Alliance and some press commentators, simply exposes their failure to come to terms with the new crisis conditions. While Thatcher's team sharpens its axe for the eighties, the old guard from Ted Heath to Ted Knight pleads for a return to the consensus politics of the past.

ALL PUBLIC EXPENDITURE is a drain on private profit which must be curbed, whatever the cost to people's lives and livelihoods.

Environment minister Patrick Jenkin recently put the Tory offensive on local government in the broader context of the state's counter crisis strategy: The government is committed to improving efficiency in all sectors of national life. A major element in our strategy is a determined attack on the "national overhead". This means looking critically at the roles and structures of public sector bodies like the Civil Service, the National Health Service and local government.'

In Thatcher's Britain, employment welfare, consensus, consultation democratic rights must all be sacrificed to the goal of reduced public spending and higher private profitability. capitalism there is no alternative.

British working class there is no alternative but to recognise that the fight to defend council jobs and services means taking on the system itself. Financial stringency and • control are the twin goals of current Tory measures against local government.

are three major sources of council income business rates central government, domestic rates. As council services have expanded over the years, the proportion of costs borne by the national exchequer in the form of the rate support grant has steadily increased. Although the rate support grant has been squeezed down over 15 decade by nearly per cent. it finances more than half of local government spending. Rates on business premises provide another fifth of council income, paid by householders the about However rate rebates sharing houses, mean that only a third of local electors pay full rates. Less than 10 per cent of council income accrues from charges such as council rents, bus fares, etc.

The bulk of council funds comes from taxation, either on incomes at the national 12 the next step, March 1984 level, or Council revenue is a deduction from the surplus value generated by capitalist enterprise.

It is a drain on capitalist profits that the capitalist class has every interest in keeping to a minimum declining profitability. Lawson put it recently, 'there is no essential difference between rates and taxes'.

demanded improved practices on economy, and effectiveness' to ease efficiency burden of council profits. councillors have Local represented the interests of local business- Their central concern has always been men. to provide essential services at the lowest possible cost. been obliged to pay out more and more to uphold council services, the meanness of the local burghers has been compounded by the parsimony of the Treasury.

growing bulk of the rate support grant has been accompanied by tighter central control over local spending. local government reorganisation is one of persistent attempts to impose professional managerial efficiency authority on council expenditure. The latest Tory measures are a move further down a response road in The Tories' plans include ICCESSIOn • rate-capping, which ment powers to penalise high spending' councils and to regulate the expenditure and rate levels of any local authority and • abolition Councils and the Greater London Council, and and the transfer of their functions to borough and district councils and boards with responsibility for the police, For British fire, public transport and, in inner London, For the education. The Tories' financial austerity local government are underlined by plans to remove responsibility centralised from councils to state boards. The encroachment of the Manpower Services Commission There areas of education and training tradit-

OVCH

and ionally undertaken by local another aspect of the centralising drive.

The Tory measures are drastic.

"high spending' councils will be forced to reduce cash spending by six per cent - a cut in real terms, allowing for inflation, of 11 or the past 12 percent. been frugal in the past will be held to a three still per cent cash increase, which amounts to a real cut when inflation is taken into account.

Taking all councils together, and rates spending cuts in the next financial year are same. of the order of seven per cent.

have calculated that would cost more in redundancy payments than it saves on wages and services. They will various certainly carry on the hatchet work into the Meanwhile the cuts proposed so far eighties. are the most draconian in the history property at the local level.

local government. especially at a time of initiated by As Chancellor Nigel He in local government. the Labour spending on private traditionally As central government has Further, the day to day spending. The history of recent teenth century, and centralised property with striking workers. deepening authorities' gives the Metropolitan County statutory joint canteen staff and caretakers.

central aims in imposing life on the dole. and tight discipline on for public transport teachers. authorities is Targeted But even councils which have provided through the NHS.

the proposed Gas, water and electricity The Tories moving any faster of Local government under attack Tories mean business "The party is over' 'Rate-capping' and 'abolition' are the culmination of a direct attack on council spending • Labour government. tne last Recognising the signs of impending crisis in 1974, Labour environment minister Anthony Crosland observed that 'the party' was over He indicated that the government would try to ensure that council workers, council tenants and people who relied on council services would shoulder the burden of the coming recession.

Where the axe Policing and education are among the oldest of local government functions, and they still account for the lion's share of In the mid ninebusinessmen in the burgeoning towns and cities of the industrial revolution set up and financed local constabulanes to protech Lacu - and, when necessary, to deal The upkeep of Britain's 120 000-strong police forces today costs around 10 percent of local expenditure. current Education has been organised through local government from the late nineteenth century in response to industry's demands for a highly trained workforce.

Almost half the total local authorities' budget (48 per cent) is now spent on schools and colleges - mostly on wages for 400 000 parks, teachers and 350 000 secretaries, cleaners, The capitalist recession breeds riots; literacy is deemed scarcely necessary for a Britain in 1984 therefore needs more policemen and less Hence, while local authorities are obliged by central government to increase spending on the police, they are also forced to cut back on education.

Many of the functions orginally performed by local councils to provide the framework for industrial development in local areas have been taken over by Before the Second World War much health care was organised at local government level; now it is mostly The DHSS has taken the provision of dole and other welfare benefits away from local bodies.

- once the products of municipal enterprise - are now the responsibility of national corporaprovide. tions. Yet local authorities have maintained and extended a wide variety of services, to fulfil their function as the local tier of the state apparatus.

Council social services departments Less than two years later, Chancellor Denis Healey imposed cash limits on central and local government spending.

Public spending was cut back by 2.5 per cent in 1976-77 and by a further 7 per cent the following year.

capital expenditure (funds for building projects plant and equipment) rather than in current expenditure (on wages and day to day running costs). Between 1974/75 and 1978/79 Labour cut capital spending on education by 42 percent and on housing by 18 per cent.

The casualties were thousands of building workers, employed directly by councils or provide home helps, meals on wheels, homes for old people and children, and services for the chronically sick, disabled and mentally ill. Personal social services employ 200 000 people and spend 9.5 per cent of council revenues. Maintaining roads costs about six per cent of total spending and council housing another four Almost a third of all housepercent. holders in Britain are in council tenancies.

Council roadworks and construction employ around 100 000 people.

The remaining council services each account for three per cent or less of local authority expenditure. These include running the buses and other forms of public transport. Councils employ 40 000 They also dustmen and 30 000 firemen.

run libraries, museums and art galleries; swimming pools and sports facilities. Planning, the administration of this complex of services, and the maintenance of a vast array of buildings, from the Royal Festival Hall to the meanest council estate, make up the functions of local government. The local state, like the national state, has expanded the range and scope of its activities to support the ailing capitalist Today around £20 billion one quarter of all public expenditure - is spent in local government. The councils' workforce has grown from 1.5 million in 1963 to 2.5 million 20 years later.

Council services are necessary to maintain the economic infrastructure and the social fabric that support capitalist enterprise at a local level. Council services are also useful to the working class.

They provide desperately needed jobs, and workers need more and better - not less and worse - of the facilities that councils The only local state amenity that is useless to the working class is the police force which exists to enforce capitalist law and order. While services are being dismantled, the police force is being expanded and re-equipped to safe.

Nobody's fooled: Labour's record won't inspire Lambeth workers by contractors, and the deteriorating fabric of council estates and public When the Tories came to power in 1979 Labour had cut capital spending to the bone.

The Tories had to turn the knife to carve into expenditure on jobs and services.

Two key components of the Tory strategy for reviving British capitalism on which the Thatcher government was elected in were reducing public cutting taxation. Given the feebleness of the British economy, both have proved much more difficult than the Tories anticipated.

Nowhere have the Tories' objectives proved vill fall guard the system from the wrath of the working class. Now local government jobs and services are facing an unprecedented attack.

the past four years of Tory government, spending cuts have reduced the council workforce by 83 000, some four per cent of the total. The victims so far include 30 000 teachers, 20 000 building workers employed in council direct labour organisations and 7 500 refuse collectors.

Tory plans to is only the beginning. abolish the GLC and the Metropolitan County Councils aim to get of 9 000 jobs at a stroke.

ment's rate-capping proposals imply a real cut in overall council spending of about seven per cent next year. According to a joint government/local authority report, even a five percent reduction would mean a cut of up to 160 000 jobs, including 60 000 teachers.

threatened with major job losses include libraries and museums, social services and The Tories seriously intend to transport. decimate local government employment - and fast. - Chancellor Nigel Lawson made clear that the Government's plans do not stop at getting rid of thousands of jobs, closing schools and allowing roads and estates to become even more dilapidated. Pointing out that two thirds of councils' current expenditure goes on wages, he recently urged administrators to take a hard line against pay rises. At the end of January they refused to increase a three per cent pay offer to 900 000 council workers.

Wages are now lower in real terms than they were live years ago. government retains one of the biggest pools of low paid employment in the Lawson also urged council managers to use privatisation or the threat of privatisation to force workers to accept job losses, harsher working conditions, and still worse pay. Workers have no option but to fight back.

buildings. councils. to 60 percent in 1979. 1979 to reduce it to expenditure and and economise. Wondit base haver conditions ernment rose slightly. Government Over with several by lost revenue. This inflation council spending. dramatic rid councils. The Governby the Government. council expenditure. Other areas altogether TaTes able. burden of taxation. local government Local case Treatens one committed to reducing. 35

CLAPTI

more difficult to achieve than in local govern- At first the Tories attempted to use the rate support grant as a lever against the The government had

LADOUT

already squeezed central state support for council spending from 66.5 per cent in 1975 Over the past four years the Tories have pushed the grant down to a level of 52.8 per cent this year, and aim slightly more than 50 per The majority of councils of all political complexions have complied to some extent with pressures to raise efficien- After reaching a peak of 2.5 million in 1979, staff levels overall have been reduced by 83 000 or 4.2 percent.

been held down and working deteriorated. However, Tory progress has been too slow for the Cabinet - last year employment in local gov- Apart from the difficulty of making substantial inroads into council spending, the faced an additional problem radical Labour authorities. While most councils acquiesced to grant cuts rationalising. services, these authorities responded by raising the rates to make up Indeed there has been general trend for rates to rise faster than as a result of the pressures The rises have been most left-wing Labour controlled Rate rises enabled councils to spend above the spending limits established Last year the total overshoot was £771m, nearly 4 percent of Three quarters of this sum was spent by 16 Labour authorities.

The Government was angered by massive rate rises because they were a local Labour defiance of central Tory diktat. It was even more concerned because high rates meant an intolerable burden on local enterprise. Back in 1974 Thatcher had promised to abolish and substitute some different form of local taxation.

By 1979 she had appreciated that this was impractic- But her government was still determined to 'set the entrepreneur free from the Yet Tory attempts to curb council spending were leading to more, not less taxation on business.

Before the 1983 election the Tories decided to trim the local authorities' budgets — and clip the wings of Labour councillors who failed to comply.

In his Briefing for cabinet ministers on policies, environment minister Patrick Jenkin outlined the Tory High local government spending and taxing Government's economic strategy.

They increase the burden of taxation which we are Our tight control of public expenditure can be undermined by overspending in so substantial a sector of the economy.

High rates feed into costs, fuel wage demands and put our anti-inflation policy at risk.'

Jenkin links the problem of high rates directly to the problem of low profitability.

In the 'question and answer' speakers' notes prepared for his Cabinet colleagues, he asks "aren't rates only industry's costs?'. be only a small proportion of industry's costs, but in terms of profits, rates can make all the difference. Living in the past 'Rate-capping' and 'abolition' measures necessary to curtail council spend- Yet the Government's plans have run into opposition, not only from the Labour Party, but also from the Tory ranks.

councillors are alarmed at the scale of the proposed cuts that will affect not only profligate Labour inner-city boroughs, but also the responsible Tory shires.

have always stood for economy in council administration. themselves on a degree of local autonomy and a paternalistic concern with the welfare of their communities. turn councillors into mere local agents of nationally imposed cutbacks.

The widespread view of Tory councillors is that the Government's assault on councils is being conducted with a bludgeon rather than with the rapier required to deal selectively with a handful of troublesome Labour boroughs. This view is shared by much of the Tory press. The pages of The Times, the Financial Times, The Economist are full of detailed criticisms of the Thatcher-Jenkin proposals. They do not demur at the Government's objectives, but they would prefer a more sophisticated approach. They want consultation rather than confrontation, and yet another inquiry into the structure of local government finance and the question of rate reform. Thatcher and Jenkin know that the past. they have little time to save British capitalism from terminal decline.

The Tory councillors have some support among another bunch of yesterday's menthe dissident former ministers now languishing on the Westminster back benches.

parliamentary revolts against the Government's rate-capping proposals and further rate support grant cuts have excited much press comment and intense hopes. But what was striking about the backbench revolts was how they were. When it came to the votes only a dozen or so Tory MPs opposed the Government and a few more abstained.

former ministers like Ted Heath and Francis Pym opposed the Government, none of the new intake of Tories voted in at the last General Election went against the Government. The new Tories of the Norman Tebbit school are more in 'tune with the ruthless spirit of the eighties than are the older generation of 'one nation' paternalists.

There is an alternative to surrender. It begins from a rejection of the ideology of good housekeeping. challenging the whole rationale of the Tory attack. The capitalist class needs to impose austerity conditions on local councils to save its system.

class needs to preserve jobs and services to guarantee its survival.

the Tory trinity of 'economy, efficiency and effectiveness' in local government.

Those are their services on the cheap. to make sure every job is safe, that wages and conditions are maintained and services, at the very least, do not get any Workers need to combat all worse spending cuts and all measures to make cuts easier by centralising state control.

Council workers must be in the front line of resistance. jobs or services should be met with industrial action. the mobilisation of council workers around coherent class defiance of the Tory offensive. It requires the reorganisation and reorientation of the trade unions in local government, which at present operate as an extension of management, not as fighting organisations of workers.

countless disputes over the past few years, policy a small proportion of The Answer: 'Rates may and expensive. are the •Good Tory government that Tory councillors But they have also prided The new plans will keeping means afford. erated in private industry.

of good housekeeping. But they are living in tives. options The more left wing, Labour Party and tenants. insignificant classes. raise rates While capitalist crisis. virtually end to that debate. take on the Government. Defend jobs and services!

That is the key to to challenge management. The working We must reject problems of getting class. Our problems are Any attempt to reduce Such action demands In Thatcher and her acolytes have made it clear that they are prepared to ride roughshod over opposition to their local government They will not be deterred councillors with vested interests, disaffected backbenchers, pompous press columnists or the Labour Party whose opposition to the Government cuts is posed in the same terms.

Labour's executive committee condemned the proposals as 'undemocratic, unworkable It called for thorough and independent review of the entire finance and Labour's structure of local government.

pleadings will cause Thatcher little difficulty.

housekeeping' New Statesman commented at the end of January, has always been a basic principle of Conservative local thinking'. Within weeks Labour GLC leader Ken Livingstone boasted 'good housekeeping at County Hall would mean a 7.5 per cent cut in rates after two years of big rises. Labour's assimilation of the ideology of good housekeeping is at the centre of its inability to defend jobs and services in local government.

Good house. making council spending dependent on what the capitalist system can It means accepting that whether or not workers have council jobs and council services depends on the level of profit gen- Good housekeeping Labour served its apprenticeship to the British establishment in local government, learning and proving it had learned the rules Today, the Tory Chancellor proclaims the doctrine of 'economy, efficiency and effectiveness' to justify the offensive on council jobs and services.

The leader of the Labour left in local government can only plead that the Tory plans are not an effective means of achieving these objectives - he cannot challenge the objec- Until now Labour councils have had two when faced with government demands for spending cuts.

They could cut services or raise the rates. In practice most councils did a bit of both, but generally the higher the rate rise. the Although high rate rises impose a greater load on local industry they also place a heavy burden on working class home owners Two thirds of domestic ratepayers receive no rate rebates, and not all of these are members of the suburban middle The great debate - cut services or was a debate over different ways of making workers pay the price of the By removing the option of raising the rates the Tories have now put an The alternatives now facing Labour councils are to cut services or As we reveal in the following pages, the Labour Party has already rejected the fighting alternative Helen Swift in town halls, refuse collection depots and social services departments, council workers have shown that they are prepared But they are held back by the suffocating ideology of public service and good housekeeping and by a trade union leadership that works hand in glove with the bosses.

The defence of council jobs and services is not just the concern of council workers — it involves the whole working Workers will move into action against Tory attacks on local government when two conditions are fulfilled.

The first is that council workers themselves The get organised and take action.

second is that workers' solidarity must be won on the basis of a cómmon class identification of their interests as workers with council employees, against the Tory attack on behalf of capital. Workers will not get actively involved in a fight against the state through a vague sympathy with town hall clerks or dustmen, still less to 'save" some bureaucratic institution that dispenses shoddy services and poor But they will take action to defend jobs and services they know are vital to the working class, against a Government they know is determined to smash working class living standards.

the next step, March 1984 13

with the cuts offensive. DEBATE at the Labour Party local conterence at Nottingham last month centred on the law.

Neil Kinnock Labour councils' resistance attacks must remain within Once the latest Tory measures capping and abolition - reach the statute book, councillors have a responsibility to stay in office and make the necessary cuts.

The aim of every Labour council should be to do its utmost to mitigate the impact on services and jobs'. GLC leader Ken Livingstone disagreed: We have to say we will not cooperate in any way, shape of form with rate-capping or If that puts us outside the law, then abolition. it is the laws that are wrong, and we have a duty to fight them." Livingstone's militant stand won handsome applause. But it is empty rhetoric.

In reality there is not even a debate about whether councils should break the law because the Labour left has already decided that it is not a realistic option.

Labour fatalism In the same week as the Nottingham conference, Labour Herald, the paper of the left-wing Labour councils, edited by Ken Livingstone and Ted Knight, carried an editorial entitled 'After it's law".

lined the realistic assumption that parliamentary opposition to the Tories' anticouncil legislation would fail and that the package of austerity measures shortly become law. what next? The first point was that 'there is no way that Labour councils can afford to concede in advance that they will be prepared to make whatever cuts the Tories demand'. The key phrase here 14 the next step, March 1984 The object of official labour movement campaigns against rate-capping and the abolition of the Metropolitan County Councils and the GLC is not to fight the cuts in local government but to survive them.

reports on how the Labour Party and the TUC are going along with reductions in council spending while making a show of opposing the Tory is 'in advance Labour emphasised that leaves to Tory the law. stage. rateded, but dards are negotiable have

COSTCOTS

this ion' option. control councils they It outtrade unions through." would The question was of practical policy. strategy the •Save Local Si Coming to terms with the cuts: Ken Livingstone rejects the fighting alternative Joan Phillips - the Labour council leaders are talking about a negotiating position, not a position of principle.

open the possibility of making concessions to Tory cuts at some later Labour starts, not from the position that all jobs and services must be defenfrom the position that concessions in working class living stan- The Labour Herald editorial proceeds by expounding the view that the only way Labour can resist the Tories' efforts to force down council spending and dismantle local services is by mobilising the strength of the local trade union movement and the support of the local communities in defence of council services'.

However, the Labour left council leaders confidence that Labour will be able to mobilise resistance against the cuts.

Anticipating eventuality, Livingstone and Knight put forward the 'majority opposit- Where Labour councillors should resign en masse and wash their hands of the cuts.

They should go into opposition against • a minority council leadership from the other parties and let them wield the axe: It cannot be ruled out that it may be necessary for Labour council leaders to explain to local trade unionists that they cannot usefully remain in office to defend local services, and that only the organised strength of the prevent the cuts going Can But what about breaking the law? Clearly Livingstone's talk of councils defying the law is for the hustings, not for the sphere When it comes to Labour councillors' only suggestion is that they should give up and Living pass the buck to the unions.

In fact opposition at Nottingham. And, Herald's editors returned to the theme "Defiance and the law' a week later, they too had forgotten the only clear-cut line of action they had recommended in the previous issue. with the need to conform to legality: The first important decision, therefore, that the Labour Party must take is that the fight against rate-capping goes on even if the Rates Bill becomes law. shown that such a fight is unlawful.

union action in defence of jobs and conditions of service has not (yet) been declared against the law. Labour councillors faced with the rate cap have a number of options for non cooperation with the cuts. Not all of them are unlawful either." It is significant that Livingstone and Knight are here considering legality of trade union action.

of the options open to Labour councillors is confined to those that are lawful.

A special background paper prepared for the Nottingham conference devotes pages to consideration of various methods of 'creative accounting' to get around the cuts. These include use of renewal and repair funds', bringing in 'next year's balances", 'accounting for arrears', 'commitment accounting, ion funds' and so on. admits that the total impact of any number of devices suggested below is likely to be quite small in relation to the authority's overall budget. At the same time, Labour Weekly produced a special supplement which detailed the 'horrendous' consequences of any attempt by Labour councils to resort to illegal borrowing to offset Government cuts. Bankruptcy, the appointment of commissioners and punitive surcharges would be the inevitable results implicitly repudiated Meanwhile a group of left-wing Labour councils in London were considering, not defying the law to fight the Tories, but trying to use the courts to challenge the legality of the Government's curbs on council spending. The broad lines of Labour's strategy that emerge from the discussions around the Nottingham conference can be briefly summarised: • The Tory rate-capping and abolition proposals will shortly become law • The Labour leadership's position is that Labour councils should obey the law and make the cuts • The Labour left councils are in favour of defying the law in theory, practice believe municipal bankruptcy and confrontations with the Government are impracticable •The Labour left councils believe their only hope lies in mobilising trade union and community resistance to cuts • The Labour left councils believe that when popular resistance and creative accounting fail, Labour should make the cuts. conclusion towards which Labour Herald's rejection of cuts inexorably leads That the Nottingham debates were so much hot air can be seen from the fact that six months previously, at another conference in Liverpool, left-wing Labour councillors had already inevitability of making cuts the left-wing London Brent, Martin Coleman, 'Labour councillors would have no option but to stay in office and try to persuade people that cuts were the fault of the Conservative Labour Herald's majority strategy was widely rejected left-wing when Labour They now seemed obsessed It has certainly not been Trade • Newcastle Jeremy risk administrative, workers. major cuts only the Discussion social services Jack 'tapping superannuat- The The document hypocrisy of a line of action as irresponsible. 1983, Council leader the council's workforce. ment. isolation and but in among Labour councils. that mass resignations, leaders anticipate dancies councillors This 1S the fights 'in advance' to conceded the The leader Borough of argued that Liverpool. Government' (The Times, 17 October 1983). Ted Knight and other council leaders did not dissent from this fatalistic response to the Tory attack even before it had begun.

Labour's bluster about defying the law is a pathetic gesture to disguise the fact that it has already given up the fight against cuts in local government.

Cut today, fight tomorrow Indeed the cuts have already begun. The following Labour councils have recently announced major austerity packages in response to Tory pressure: - £12m Council leader Beecham has announced that 1300 of the council's 18 000 jobs are at Redundancies threaten teachers, clerical and manual Schools and social services face • Cleveland - £9m Labour group leader Sir Maurice Sutherland has declared 500 redundancies and cuts in education and • Wakefield - £4.5m Labour leader Sir Smart has ordered compulsory redundancies and closures of six libraries.

an old people's home and two nurseries.

When staff and parents occupied the nurseries, the Labour council went to the courts to secure their eviction - but the occupations continue Wakefield case is significant because Sir Jack Smart is also chair of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities.

This brings together the big city councils and is a leading force in the protest campaign against the Government's rate.

capping and abolition proposals.

In the of his campaigning against Government cuts while making cuts in his own council, Smart personifies Labour Party policy on local government.

The national Labour Party response to the only council which has so far attempted to make any stand against the Government - Liverpool - reveals the hollowness of its anti-Tory posturing. As a result of a series of Government meas ures, Liverpool City Council, elected in faces a major cut in funding.

and Militant supporter Derek Hatton has spelt out the alternatives of raising the rates by 200 percent or sacking 5000 workers, nearly a fifth of The council has declared its refusal to take either option and its intention of defying the Govern- Every statement from Labour's national leadership emphasises the danger of individual councils being picked off in urges unity The practical consequence of this advice is to delay any action until spring 1985 when Labour that as many as 20 Labour councils will be in the firing line.

But workers threatened with redunand reduced services now in Liverpool and elsewhere cannot wait 12 months for the Labour leadership. In the meantime, Labour's senior spokesmen have made it clear that they will not back Liverpool or any other council which defend jobs and services Labour's environment spokesman Jack Straw declared last month that the parliamentary leadership could not promise open ended support without knowing what action Liverpool might take'. Sheffield Labour leader David Blunkett, who is also council spokesman on Labour's national executive, said last month that 'there will be a great deal of sympathy for But' continued, the other left-wing authorities are not'in the same position as Liverpool so there is no

Since the advent of left-wing Labour Hackney administrations in Camden, Labour councillors and trade union bureaucrats have built up wellestablished patterns of collaboration.

This cosy relationship is now being threatened as Labour comes under increasing pressure to cut services and adopt tougher measures against its The bureaucrats are being employees. by-passed; now Labour councils have to attack their employees directly.

Nalgo is Britain's largest whitecollar trade union. It has a lot to lose from the Tory attack on local govern- Well over half its members work in this sector. Last year, while Nalgo's total membership declined slightly, the number of local government members rose slightly to just short of 50 000. bureaucracy in local government is largely the creation of the Labour Ever since the winter of Party. 1978/79, discontent in councils have tried to pre-empt rank and file revolt by integrating a core of union activists. hall bureaucrats date from this period.

councils have Left-wing Labour attempted to build the Whitley negotiating structure right down to the departmental level. eighties there were scarcely any fulltime union officials in local government. Today, in Hackney and Camden, every union bureaucrat spends at least 50 per cent of his time on union business. As the bureaucrats have burgeoned, so too has the machinery Hackney and Camden are both typical of Labour councils which combine radical rhetoric with attacks on their employees. their influence with council union officials to negotiate punitive local agreements and win acceptance for their cost-cutting measures.

way they can take the same stand Unity for the Labour joining together to put off any action against the cuts, and standing firm by constitutional and financial cuts inevitable. that make stab them in the back going to Blunkett's final, almost prophetic, statement on Liverpool. leadership's clear declarations of its intention to betray Liverpool, Militant's plea ranks of the movement are that looking for a positive and unambiguous the national executive statement from committee and the parliamentary Labour Party' was either naive or cynical. Labour leaders anticipate that a rebellion by a handful of right-wing Labour councillors will scupper Liverpool's rebellion and get both them - and Hatton - off the hook.

Sham democracy We have seen that Labour council leaders place great emphasis on the importance of mobilising trade union and community resistance to the Tory offensive on local However, the object government. campaigns is more to revive and these popularise the Labour Party than to fight Yet the record of the Labour the cuts. Party in local government makes this limited objective difficult to achieve.

As employers, Labour councils are just as bad, if not worse than Tory councils.

They maintain the same low wages and poor conditions. Labour often more effective than Tory councils using their links with the unions to in restrain "militancy. prepared to fight for jobs, but they are sceptical of campaigns run by bosses, especially acquiescence to cutbacks (see box).

of shoddy services, providers deeply councils working class people. waiting lists for flats, nurseries, estates, old people's homes, and bureaucracy are most people's experience of 'the council'.

Many Labour councillors have Working together council officials and local Nalgo branch. - cuts by a longer name. Faced campaigns. The Nalgo social workers' dispute. Labour the dispute Today's town workers in the country, socialist credentials. Before the early more cynical. Both have used

BELCILES.

spending Labour councis. Often conscious of the low Party means proprieties •We are not consciousness was Given the Labour children. illusioned many workers. has shown the way. of local Labour Party. cent cut in services. even well worth Islington', councils are Council workers are up by 30 per cent. these are used to win As Labour unpopular among Jerry-built council Greater threatened past three years. become prominent members of the Labour Party and the In Hackney, for instance, Richard Shields is both a Nalgo steward and a founder of the Last Labour Party workplace branch.

year he was appointed by the council to supervise its decentralisation plans with the Government's swingeing attack on council expenditure, Hackney and Camden Labour councils are attempting to rally workers' support for their anti-cuts But the experience of workers in these boroughs gives them little incentive to heed the bureaucrats or defend their Labour employers.

Hackney workers discovered that there was little progressive about their socialist councillors during the course of the three month long residential As Labour threatened victimisations and closed homes, Nalgo officials sought to bring under control, urging workers to 'unite and fight the Tories'.

As some of the lowest paid council Camden council's employees are not enthusiastic about the Labour administration'S And their experience of Labour's industrial relations policy has left them even Last year Camden closed two children's homes, encouraged workers to scab on the water workers' strike, and was involved in two regrading disputes with town hall typists and with council storeworkers.

The council refused to negotiate the claims while strike action continued, but the disputes ended quickly when Nalgo and Nupe negotiated settle- Neither the typists nor the storeworkers got their full claim.

Hackney and Camden are both at the top of the Tories' hit list of high- Hackney esteem in which council services are held since they have been forced, generally for the first time, to solicit public support. This has led to patronising campaigns to 'raise workers' of the good works performed on their behalf by the council.

Blunkett, who personifies this approach, writes of the need for councillors to *stimulate and organise the process of understanding within their own communities'. They will find it difficult to make people understand why Labour councils have condemned families to the squalor and seclusion of tower blocks, why they still put old people in workhouse homes, and why there are no nurseries for their The record of left-wing Labour councils in past campaigns against the cuts has dis- For the past five years they have vacillated between making cuts and raising rates, generally doing a bit of both. In London, Lambeth In July 1979 Ted Knight proposed a cuts package of 4.5 percent, but this was overturned by the Nine months later the council raised the rates by 49 per cent, and a year after that introduced a 10 per Now Lambeth town hall carries a banner Lambeth services - Lambeth defending', but workers do not want to know.

Fortress left-wing council the most ever, elected after the mass defection of the old guard Labour Party to the SDP, followed the Lambeth line. In July 1982 the Labour group voted against any rate rises; the following spring it put the rates Now local people are awaiting announcement of the cuts.

Outside London, Labour councils have generally implemented cuts in response to measures. earlier Government austerity Council, now Manchester cut its with abolition, has. workforce by more than 5000 over the It has put many of its directly employed manual workers on to An insult to Hackney workers: claims it needs to spend at least £96m in the coming financial year Government's spending target is £78.9m. Labour councillors must make the choice between defying the Government by doubling the rate demand or cutting services by a quarter and jobs by 1600. Camden's budget is £123.5m, the Government's The choice facing the target £101.6m. council is a 20 percent rate increase or massive cuts in jobs and services. Both councils are on course for making cuts.

Camden's position of 'no redundancies' has already been modified by council leader Phil Turner: We are not going to cut services for But there will be which a need exists. reductions where need for services has disappeared." Redundancies aren't far Camden has already announced a cut of £3.7m in departmental budgets at the town hall and the closure of two more children's homes As Labour councils press ahead with their rationalisation plans, the scope for consultation diminishes, causing trouble for the union officials.

Hackney Nalgo bureaucrat Tommy Douras failed to win acceptance for short term contracts so that it can easily get rid of them at short notice.

prisingly it is having difficulty rallying sympathy for its campaign In Scotland, where the cuts abolition. have already gone further than in England Labour councils have gone and Wales, along with cuts after a short-lived gesture of defiance at Lothian. made cuts worth £12m and Glasgow, £6m.

Labour's campaigns are more likely to stir the sympathies of the sort of middle class quango activists

WILU

council chambers and constituency offices than they are to mobilise the working The campaigns' twin themes are class. the defence of economic efficiency and local democracy. West Yorkshire County Council leader John Gunnell, one of the leading camagainst abolition, paigners defence of the existing structure of local government on its economic merits.

metropolitan counties', he declares, 'have achieved the economies of scale for which they were created'. has streamlined administration and got rid of 1200 jobs. more efficient, less costly and equally accountable structure can be provided' then Gunnell would be all for it.

this hotch potch of councillor quangos and committees his office he reckons does not fit the The Metropolitan County Councils bill. have commissioned the management consultants Coopers and Lybrand to make an independent assessment of the Tories' These arguments may appeal to plans. the middle class radicals who have been on to council payrolls brought the past decade. But they don't appeal to workers. efficiency means job losses, low wages, and higher productivity Workers need every job, with services. decent wages and conditions, and we want services according to according to the miserable penny-pinching dictates of the capitalist state.

Alight. decentralisation. - the motions rejecting the campaign. cuts in services. away. from their members. defend jobs and services.

Not suragainst even democracy Last year Lothian inability of populate Labour democracy councils are accountable. value of fighting for bases "The West Yorkshire itself Tory offensive If a more effective. But middle-of-the-road - which would remove wavering over Labour's commitment to cheapskate the state. our needs, not class. Hackney peopi are getting a bum deal! the council's draft agreement on Now veteran Communist Party and Nalgo executive member Ivan Beavis is facing similar problems. If the union officials don't succeed, the council will be forced to bypass the negotiating procedure and impose the changes unilaterally.

In Camden, the bureaucrats are already squealing about not being 'consulted' on the closure or tne caudren s nomes.

Joint council and union campaigns against the Tory cuts invariably disguise attacks on jobs and services.

In Hackney, supporters of the next step and other activists have passed council-run A meeting of Hackney Nalgo voted instead for a joint union based on resolute opposition to all redundancies and Nalgo officials have always relied on the patronage of Labour councils to maintain their niche in local government.

Years of collaboration have left them isolated This situation provides local government workers with the opportunity to take matters into their own hands and rebuild the unions into fighting organisations to Andrew Matthews *Defend local democracy' is the other clarion call of the Labour Party.

But workers know that local democracy is an bigger sham than parliamentary Revolutionary workers will always oppose any attempt by the state We are in to restrict democratic rights.

favour of the widest extension of democracy in national and local government.

the The more democratic the system, greater the opportunities to expose the capitalist system to the guarantee workers a decent life The Party's rhetoric about local 1s simply al defend its vested interest in preserving a stake in the local state apparatus. Labour democratic nor neitner The Labour Party will have hard job convincing workers of the the privilege of voting every four years for a council that treats the working class with contempt.

Labour and the state The Labour Party's campaigns against the are a measure of how irrelevant the official labour movement has become for the working class. In the hope of reaping some wider electoral advantage, Labour substitutes appeals to for public - opinion eftective. action to save jobs and services.

Yet by narrowing the focus of its campaigns to appeal to dissident Tories and supporters. of the Alliance, Labour renders itself marginal to the needs of the working class. Workers need action not public sympathy. Labour's long quest for respectability, intensified by its recent General Election humiliation.

leads it to sacrifice working class interests to retain its allegiance to the state. That is why, at the end of the day, Labour would always rather make cuts than fight It is also why in today's recession, workers' continuing loyalty to the Labour Party is the Tories' most powerful weapon against the working the next step, March 1984 15

Trotsky on womens liberation Ism will not emancipate them.

West. Stalin. Trotsky wrote little about the oppression of women under capitalism.

the common Bolshevik position, developed from the materialist tradition established by Marx and Engels, that socialist revolution was necessary to free women from their conditions of servitude Tsarist Russia. Writing shortly before the Lenin summed up the link revolution, between restrictions on women's rights and capitalism: "In most cases the right to divorce will remain unrealisable under capitalism, for the oppressed sex is subjugated economically. No matter how much democracy there is under the woman remains a "domestic slave"" Under Tsarism men were allowed to beat their wives, whose obedience was commanded by law. women wore veils and were forbidden to read or write. All women had to ask their husband's permission to travel, study or work. Divorce was prohibitively expensive and required proof. Women's wages in the towns were 16 the next step, March 1984 Kate Marshall outlines Trotsky's approach to women's liberation Women fighting for their rights today are often asked - 'what about Russia?'.

Both conservatives and feminists argue that the position of women in the Soviet Union proves that Marxism is irrelevant to women and that social- Union lack basic amenities, use abortion as a method of birth control, and have to queue for hours for shoddy goods and basic foods. The position of women in the Eastern bloc is indeed unenviable to most women in the Leon Trotsky was one of the leaders of the 1917 revolution in Russia.

He continued to uphold the banner of revolutionary working class politics through the twenties and thirties as the revolution was betrayed under His writings express a Marxist understanding of the links between women's liberation and socialism and between women's oppression in the Soviet Union and the degeneration of the revolution.

about half men's. He shared overthrow The Bolsheviks oppression In some rural areas The tasks trade, therefore twofold. extraordinary would rights to women. Anybody can see that women in the Soviet For Lenin and Trotsky, women's emancipation depended on the of Tsarism and the development of socialism in Russia.

"The position of women is the most graphic and telling indicator for evaluating a social regime and state policy' (Trotsky 1938) The Bolshevik position considered that the of rooted ir welch Was women's economic inequality, especially in their roles as housewives and mothers.

of the were First, the new order grant full legal and democratic Second, it would begin to abolish domestic work, women to get fully involved in society and weakening the grip of the family.

The emancipation key part of the programme of the Russian Revolution. promised equal political universal suffrage. ation of the church from the state and for a free secular education for all children It held that women would be freed from dangerous jobs and all night work, given maternity leave and free medical care. It also established the right for women to breast feed their babies during working hours and for the appointment of women factory inspectors to ensure that women's working conditions were improved.

In its early legislation the Soviet state fulfilled its commitments to rights. Its laws were the most progressive in the history of the world.

and abortion it guaranteed every woman the right to leave her husband and terminate an unwanted pregnancy. However, as Lenin and Trotsky argued, legal and political equality does not equality. For women to achieve their liberation in the real world as well as on the books required economic develstatute opment and a political struggle against every barrier to freedom.

Trotsky linked increased productivity thus freeing women of women was a more productive. The Bolshevik programme rights It stood for the separ religion, art, and philosophy. uctivity women's "The On divorce ist accumulation. of morals." and ward on fronts. mean social part advance the revolution of capitalism to women's emancipation. To be free needed better education, social services and superior health care.

To provide these things society had to be To make society more productive women had to be involved in every way in industry, in agriculture, in services and in decision-making.

Drawing women in to play an active role in society demanded improvements in what Trotsky called "morals' and 'culture. This included all facets of life, from working conditions in factories and farms to customs, the law, science, literature, design Culture and society In the early twenties Trotsky explained the connection between culture and prodslightest success in the sphere of morals, by raising the cultural level of the working man and woman, enhances our capacity for rationalising production, and promoting social- This again gives us the possibility of making fresh conquests in the sphere Trotsky recognised that given the poverty backwardness of Russia progress would be slow. In his view there were two reasons why it was essential to move forthe political and ideological First, it was vital to ensure that limited resources were directed in such a way that ordinary workers in Russia and abroad would immediately appreciate the benefits of the revolution.

Second, preparing the ideological ground would help to move the revolution ahead once the basic economic difficulties were resolved.

other words, Trotsky's attention to questions of women's emancipation was of a continuing class struggle to The dead weight - and capitalist prejudices exerted a powerful, negative

influence on the development of Soviet

DUCICLY.

When feminists repudiate Marxism, claiming that it puts everything down to economic factors and neglects ideology, they miss the point. the Russian Revolution shows that taking only women's liberation. take because women cannot be free under capitalism. Under however, the struggle for women's liberation continues alongside struggle to raise the level of production that politics change rapidly, cling tenaciously to the past.

the Russian workers were used to treating women as family slaves, communists to take drastic measures to confront the old ideas: In our traditional views, conditions there is much that is truly thickheaded and that needs to be smashed with a battering ram.' Progress in changing attitudes would have important pracucal drawing out of

WOLLCH

confines of the home. indicate how far the revolution had gone in clearing out the superstitions religious prejudices that around the family hearth.

Acid test The French socialist Charles Fourier, writing early in the nineteenth century, argued that any society could be judged by women's position in it.

gratulated him on the discovery. Trotsky applied this maxim in his assessment of the Russian Revolution in 1925: *The most accurate way of measuring our advance is by the practical measures which are being carried out for the improvement of the position of mother and child.

very reliable; it does not deceive. It immediately shows both the material successes and the cultural achievements in the broad sense."

The break-up of the family by revolution and war led to experiments in collective organisation of household tasks and new living arrangements. ists seized control of the revolution these reversed. gains

WETE

conservative instinct', wrote Trotsky, the taken bureaucracy has "disintegration" of the family.

singing panegyrics to the family supper and the family laundry, that is, the household slavery of women. Revolution betrayed, the progress of the Soviet Union on the "problem of problems' - the transformation of women's work in the home into the work ot society. although women had initially appreciated Marxists cannot prove that socialist revolution will liberate women.

can however prove, both theoretically and empirically, that women will never be free under capitalism. continuation of capitalism relies on women's work in the home. Women's unpaid labour reproduces workers' capacity to work day in day out, year in generation

OUL.

Capital has no interest in generation. abolishing the burden of housework that keeps women down, but every interest in maintaining the division between the sexes that it enforces.

we look at the position of women in capitalist societies around the world over the past century we see a remarkable uniformity. differences in degree, but everywhere women face household drudgery and act as a reserve labour force.

We can also explain how socialist revolution could liberate Under socialism economic development will no longer be restrained by the narrow goal of making profits.

The economy will be organised and planned according to the needs of society. A socialist society would not The experience of the first step to It is a vital step to workers" state, the broader In 1923elrotsky noted but morals Because Trotsky urged concepts, and the Soviet Union. consequences the Hallow It would also and flourished state provision. tions in state nurseries.

torn. 1935, Engels conthan This index is But once the Stalin- 'Guided by its Nobody alarm the at It began day after the revolution.

In 1936, in sky was only Trotsky examined noted: He noted that Communist Party. Revolution and liberation We The sion under capitalism. aLe: socialist revolution. If from overthrowing There are Revolutionary demonstrates women. indifference. will prove it. Leon Trotsky was born in 1879. At the age of 26 he became president of the St. Petersburg Soviet during the defeated revolution in 1905. In 1917 he returned to the same city to lead the Bolshevik insurrection.

Following the revolution Trotsky organised the resistance to the forces of reaction both inside and outside the country.

He created the Red Army, an effective.

politically conscious army of the working class, to defend the revolution.

During the Civil War Lenin, who led the Bolshevik Party and the new Government, gave Trotsky a free hand as supreme military commander.

After Lenin's death Trotsky led the fight against the degeneration of the Russian Revolution under Stalin. But he was outmanoeuvred by Stalin, expelled from the Communist Party and finally, in 1927, deported from Trotsky never At the age of 17 Trotsky was the benefits of collective childcare, they were soon put off by the poor quality of Children caught infec- Clothes sent to socialised laundries were stolen, or As soon as rationing was ended in workers resumed their old habits of eating their main meal at home rather communal restaurants. For Trotsky the retreat to the home was less a condemnation of the socialist system than a fair comment on the poor altern- 'There are no limits to masculine egotism. To change the conditions of life we must learn to see through women's eyes' (Trotsky 1923) atives offered by the bureaucracy.

expected a happy life' the The working class knew that its society was too poor and uncultured to change rapidly.

Trotbeing realistic when he *The real resources of the state did not correspond to the plans and intentions of the You cannot "abolish" the family; you have to replace it. The actual libhave to rely on women's privatised domestic toil. It could organise proper childcare facilities and ways of providing people with food, clothing and shelter to relieve women of all these tasks. A socialist society would have every interest in treating women as equals and sweeping away all the sexist drivel that reinforces women's oppres- Marxists do not postpone fighting for women's liberation until after the Indeed Marxists are the most consistent fighters for women's rights in capitalist society.

This is because we have no stake in the existing system and everything to gain The Communist Party commitment to women's liberation in practice - in fighting the Tory cuts, employers' attacks, bourgeois morality, labour movement chauvinism, working class No, we cannot at present prove that workers' revolution will bring about women's liberation.

DUL

in the course of the class struggle, we Life of a revolutionary introduced to Marxism by Alexandra Sokolovskaya, who was in her late twenties. When he was 21, and in prison for political activities, they married and were exiled together. She had two daughters in the next two years, then urged him to leave her and join Lenin in London, where he was working on the paper Iskra.

always regretted the separation, appre ciating the difficulties facing a single mother. Trotsky met Natalya Sedova during his stay in Paris in 1903. They never married but stayed together until his death. Natalya was politically active, militant and vivacious. While Trotsky was in prison in the year following the 1905 revolution, his first son, Lev, was born. Sergei, the second, was born in 1908. The family was close, but beset by tragedy. Friends and visitors remarked on the strong affection binding the couple and the boys, and the major part Trotsky took in childeration of women is unrealisable on the basis of "generalized want". the bureaucracy went infinitely But further than iron demands. Because it failed to organise production under the control of the working class it could not root out scarcity or shortage. Instead it threw millions of workers into obsolete production and encouraged women to make up for the absence of consumer goods by their own toil. It returned to the capitalist system of women's free labour in the home as an alternative to replacing the family and organising production. improving its inadequate abortion facilities it took the road of prohibition, and, as in other spheres, made a virtue Trotsky condemned the burnecessity. eaucracy for its betrayal of women: *These gentlemen have, it seems, completely forgotten that socialism Wa the cause which impels

FIGHT FO

A WOMAN'

RIGHT

WORN

the capitalist system interests. Trotsky economic necessity bolised the hands of Stalin. liberation, we side

LOUS

the capitalist system. Rather than of out resources woman to

DEFEND

WOMEN S

RICHI

TO

WORK

RHE TO

NOT A

PRIVILEYE!

Campaigning for jobs and nurseries in Leeds: our fight for women's rights is a fight against care and household tasks.

This increased in later years as Natalya pursued her artistic and political The new laws passed after the revolution allowed either partner in a marriage to take the surname of the other, or retain their original name.

Trotsky took the name of his wife, Sedov, and their two sons took the Of Trotsky's four children only one survived him.

In 1928 his first daughter Nina died of consumption (tuberculosis) at the age of 26. In 1933 his second daughter Zinaida committed suicide in Berlin, following the news that her Soviet citizenship had been revoked by Stalin.

Trotsky's son Sergei died in Paris in 1938 in suspicious circumstances.

Trotsky believed he had been poisoned by Stalinist agents. Two years later Trotsky himself was murdered by a GPU agent at his desk in Mexico.

abortion, and not force her into the "joys of motherhood" with the help of a foul police interference in what is to every woman the most intimate sphere of life."

Trotskyism today Trotsky upheld the cause of women's liberation against the Stalinists because the gains women made after 1917 sympossibilities of socialism The reversal in women's position during the thirties was a key measure of the defeat of the Russian Revolution at the Today only Trotskyists can defend the necessity of workers power as a precondition for women's We are not forced to issue apologies for the Soviet bureaucracy's assault on women's rights. But neither do feminists who merely describe the obvious - that the Soviet Union has not liberated women - and thereby justity their own accommodawith capitalism. By rejecting revolution as the first step to women's emancipation, feminists condemn women to domestic toil and exploitation under Trotsky fought against Stalinism and feminism because he put the interests of The fight working women to the fore continues today against Stalinists and feminists who put forward a feminist incomes policy, housework-sharing and job-sharing as a means to redistribute working within the class. Women who want not a larger slice, but the whole cake - read Trotsky!

the next step, March 1984 17

Apartheid expansionism OPERATION ASKARI, the invasion of thousand Angola by several African soldiers in December, was the latest and the largest scale excursion of the Pretoria regime over its northern The main targets of these frontiers. have been the radical governassaults ments of Angola and Mozambique, both established in the mid-seventies after long struggles against Portuguese colonialism.

South African attempts to frustrate the liberation movements at the time failed.

Pretoria has subsequently used every method from internal subversion external undermine

TO I

independence of its northern neighbours.

Since Zimbabwe became independent in 1980 and SWAPO intensified its struggle to liberate Namibia, South Africa *Africa is an integral part of a global political arena, and this administration has no intention of adopting a unilateral self-denying ordinance when Western strategic interests are at stake'. So says Ronald Reagan's man in Africa, Chester Crocker. When it comes to the crunch in southern Africa, the Reagan administration had no qualms about dropping past anti-apartheid rhetoric and backing apartheid expan- Africa's drive to sionism. South subordinate its black neighbours fits in well with America's concern to stabilise capitalist relations world-wide.

The apartheid state has been enlisted as America's African gen- The US-led 'contact group' darme. of imperialists with a stake in southern Africa - including Britain, France, West Germany and Canada - has effectively endorsed the South African occupation of Namibia. Its policy of 'constructive engagement' accepts the pretext offered by South Africa, of the presence of Cuban troops in Both America and Britain 18 the next step, March 1984 The tanks roll in: South Africa steps up the offensive against its northern neighbours South African occupation. Africa's growing regional empire.

attempt. stepped up hostilities against Angola and to Mozambique. a ne South Africa has wrecking activities of Jonas Unita guerrillas In mercenaries in Mozambique. It has also refused to support the United Nations vote to deplore the South African invasion of Angola in December.

On the contrary, ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick viewed South Africa's pre-Christmas ceasefire offer as la major new step in the arduous process of trying to resolve southern African problems peacefully.

She presented South Africa's cynical manoeuvre as a 'delicate' and 'hopeful process advancing South Africa's diplomatic objectives by arranging talks with Angola in the former Portuguese colony of Cape Verde in January.

Chester Crocker mediated between the protagonists, secured the month-long ceasefire sought by South Africa, and now hopes to supervise the settlement of Namibia's future in further talks.

All the imperialist powers are up to their necks in the apartheid bloodbath.

When South Africa ran into financial problems in 1982 it had no trouble securing an immediate $1.1 billion loan from the US-dominated Inter- 33. South Africa's recent invasion of Angola had two objectives. The first was to crush SWAPO, the organisation fighting to free Namibia from South The second was to subordinate Angola to South indicate that the massive military might of the apartheid regime has inflicted a setback on the SWAPO forces.

overcome Angola's defences, and they sustained high casualties in the The anti-imperialist struggle of the black masses of southern Africa remains a mortal threat to the tyranny of apartheid.

launched a series of raids: sponsored the Protea (June Savimbi's and MRN bases in southern Angola Angola Contact with the West kills national Monetary Fund. amounts to $30 billion. America's UN America played a key role in Africa. Western imperialists. espionage trial in construction. bique The terms of last month's ceasefire Yet Pretoria's troops failed to the

SCSOVE

• Operations Smokeshell (June 1980), 1981), Daisy (November 1981), were all directed against SWAPO • The bomb attack on oil, rail and port Total foreign investment in South Africa Britain accounts for half the total.

apartheid sentiment among British businessmen has not stopped them almost doubling direct investment in South Africa over the past decade.

Socialist France has also swallowed its and sold two 900 megawatt nuclear reactors to South Now it is providing the processed fuel to service these plants and is considering offering two more.

Even though South Africa is not a date'. member of Nato, its military power is substantially underwritten by the Angola. The recent South Africa Africa. revealed the extent of British and American connections with the South Angola African murder machine. Information USA's from the secret Silvermines underground tracking station at the Cape is forwarded to America and to Britain.

Indeed the USA partly funded its French Mirage jets installations at Beira (December 1982) and air raids on Maputo (May and October 1983) aimed to destabilise Mozam- South Africa's aggressive policy is partly designed to contain the internal threat to regime from the African National Congress by attacking its bases abroad The air strikes on Maputo were a direct response to an ANC bomb in Pretoria.

But South Africa's expansionism has a It is an attempt broader purpose problems the of recession South Africa by subordinating the whole region to its rule. Exporting the crisis Since the Second World War South Africa has developed into a modern capitalist enable the South African air force to wipe out villages and refugee camps far beyond its borders. While all the imperialists back South Africa, its invasion of Angola revealed some significant divisions in the Western ranks. America was obliged to go out on a limb in support of the South African action as the "contact group" virtually collapsed.

Early in December, French foreign minister Claude Cheysson requested that the group 'be put to sleep, being unable to carry out faithfully its mancondemned the Hrance US/South African alliance against France has massive investments and interests in black wants to undermine American influence throughout the continent it took advantage of the invasion to upset the grand plans. In the new scramble for Africa's spoils, imperialists are beginning to fall out amongst themselves. That can only be to the advantage of Africa's masses.

economy. investment. other capitalist Given the apartheid high risk strategy. African state of the sive Trade investment. In 1982 Africa, According to under the Place Lesotho and Southern countries OL integrated into South economy. otho, 60 per cent in Swaziland and 37 per cent in Botswana. Namibia is also firmly in the economic of Pretoria. grip government contributes half the total revenue of the Namibian administration for the war against SWAPO.

BE CHEEV

Most of the rest is provided by mining companies: De Beers Consolidated Diamond Mines, Rio Tinto Zinc. stake of these ment three While South Africa neighbours, the black working class at home has launched a strike wave on a scale not seen since the seventies.

mid-January 20 000 black workers had stopped production in car assembly plants, supermarkets, refineries and At AECI - one third British- Barlow South of the disputes. unfortunately had fallen to 8 per cent, from levels of 19 percent in the late sixties.

recession forced the capitalists to cut working class living standards. Harsher exploitation unleashed a wave of black forcing it to The countries of South Yet the precarious economy • Luanda South Africa The true level is Benguela Botswana, E Lubango the three African Mocamedes African major source of The South African domestic product. South three hold over TSUMEB and Britain's Mozambique; The combined investcompanies and Zimbabwe Workers on the rise terrorises its Soweto uprising. By

COCTO

black community. The fact resolve

WO KETS

has The black to 5:1 by 1982. Yet per cent a year. in soul Alrica. By working class The

CABINDA

LUBANGO LINE

------ Menongue Cuvelai •

NAMIBIA

amounts to more than Namibia's gross used Africa has and its control over transport as well as military methods to tighten its strangle- In 1979 South region. Africa's black neighbours - Angola and Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland; Malawi and Tanzania; Zambia the Southern - set up militancy which culminated in the Taken aback by the vigour of the working class response, the South African state was obliged to with attempts to integrate at least some sections of the The regime modified some of the more blatant aspects of apartheid and agreed to The recognise black trade unions.

bosses attempted to raise productivity labour shortages by training blacks to take over jobs traditionally performed by white South African capitalism sustained a temporary reprieve between 1979 and 1982 when gold prices recovered.

working class took advantage of this partial recovery to close wage differentials with white workers. From 20:1 in 1979, they fell The number of black trade unionists grew by a quarter of a million over the same period.

This process halted in 1982 as the recession returned with a vengeance. Detentions of black trade union leaders were again stepped up. The torture and murder of union activist Neil Aggett in 1982 indicated the increasingly coercive approach of the regime to the trade Black living standards are now declining at a rate of more than four However, growing poverty and unemployment have never been a barrier to working class protest Ine past success or South African capitalism has produced a powerful social force in the black Undiminished by apartheid, undefeated by state repression, the workers are the best hope for upsetting South Africa's reign of terror at home and abroad.

ZAIRE

ZAMBIA

• Harare •

NAMIBIA

LIMBABWE

[BOTSWANA

Maputo Pretoria

SOUTH AFRICA

LESOTHO

BENGUELA RAILWAY

ZAMBIA

CUNENE ENCLAVE

African Development Coordinating Conference in an attempt to break out of their dependence on the apartheid state.

These nine countries have a combined population of 65 million, in comparison with South Africa's South Africa's GDP of $85 billion is almost four times as big.

power has made it impossible for the black nations to go potentially the strongest of the babwe, borne group, African sanctions. under white rule, South Africa cooperated closely its When Robert Mugabe took over from lan Smith and his stooges, Zimbabwe became a focus for the other black nations in the region and a potential threat to South African economic hegemony.

immediately abolished the trade agreement it had maintained with To white Rhodesia. tourist trade it ordered all travellers to obtain visas for visits to Zimbabwe.

South African authorities exports of tobacco from Zimbabwe by withdrawing locomotives at harvest time.

South Africa has used its controls over the regional railway weapon in its expansionist strategy.

October 1982 the state transport service was earning R213m from SADCC members in freight charges alone.

time, 7000 South African rail trucks were moving on foreign rail systems and up to 1500 foreign trucks were on South African South Africa has taken advantage rails. of inferior breakdown and repair facilities in the region to lend its trains and thus extend its control even present South Africa has 27 locomotives on loan to Zimbabwe, 12 to Zaire, 10 to Zambia and seven to Mozambique.

the same time, MRN and Unita guerrillas and regular South African forces ensure that little or no traffic can use the railway from Zimbabwe to the coast through Mozambique, the or through Angola. Zambian copper, tea from Malawi and tobacco from Zimbabwe, must all go to the sea via South Africa.

after the raid on Beira, South African rail tariffs increased by 15 per cent Angola and Mozambique have been increasingly drawn under South Africa's economic control. depends heavily on oil and diamonds.

While the American Gulf Oil company controls the Cabinda oil fields, the Lunda Norte diamond mines are run by the South African firm De Beers.

keeps diamond Africa from smugglers. combined impact

MALAWI

now face starvation.

MOZAMBIQUE

SWAZILAND

and high

ZAIRE

economy. invasion of Angola. with Cuban help. foreign affairs. the Unita guertillas. Last mid-November 30 million. Yet South African 100 fighter it alone. Zimthe brunt of South When Rhodesia was economic development. The Pretoria preferential undermine the inland gue The sabotaged the month network as a key In At any one ambitions. bique's further. At Namibia.

SWAPO

Benguela railway long disputed territory. Thus Zairean and battlefield. One month bully allies January. Angola's economy temporary South inside its borders. producers Angola (and in Botswana and Zaire) in line through its international monopoly over the distribution of diamonds. It also encourages theft by buying up supplies Mozambique has less natural resources than Angola and the of recession, South African destabilisation and drought have reduced the country to famine and destitution. One third of its 12 million people South Africa has ravaged its neighbours but it has yet to overcome its domestic slump. In the first three quarters of 1983 the gross domestic product of South Africa fell by 4.5 percent.

The recent drought has so far cost an estimated R1.5m in lost foreign exchange earnings.

Inflation and unemployment are rising, American interest rates are forcing down the price of gold - still a significant factor in the South African Continuing crisis at home means more terror abroad - hence the Terror strikes Angola Back in 1975 the Angolans defeated Unita and an amateurish South African force The South African Defence Force was subsequently rearmed and rejuvenated to play a major role in Since August 1981 it has maintained a permanent base in Cunene province on the Angola/Namibia border, from which it has supplied and supported To keep Unita at bay the Angolan government has acquired the services of a force of 25 000 Cubans.

October the Angolan government launched a major offensive against Unita.

The South African-backed forces suffered a serious defeat in Mussende province in and they pushed were back elsewhere as well. In response South Africa secretly despatched an invasion The force force in early December. included 10 000 troops and four units of heavy artillery and tanks, backed up by aircraft. Following heavy fighting before Christmas, South Africa offered Angola a ceasefire, and at the United Nations it proposed to withdraw its troops from Cunene province Only when Angola rejected this offer did South Africa publicly announce that its forces were already deep inside Angola. offered the pretext that it had invaded to prevent a SWAPO invasion of Namibia.

South Africans succeeded destroying SWAPO's base at Cuvelai, but failed to breach the regular Angolan defences which stretch from Mocamedes on the coast through Lubango to Menon- By early January the invaders had been forced to withdraw to At the end of their enclave in Cunene. offered to disengage they completely' from Angola Gunpoint diplomacy After the slaughter, talks. South African premier P W Botha aims to drive representatives of black Africa to the negotiating table where he hopes to dictate the terms of their subordination to his continental He has recently forced Mozam- Samora Machel to accede 'good neighbourly relations", while South African-sponsored mercenaries raped and pillaged in the countryside, and people starved on the main streets of Maputo.

Last month Botha greeted 'a very promising climate' for talks about the future of created by his bloodbath in Botha hopes to use his increased leverage against Angola to press South into discussions Africa's stooges in Namibia about the terms of an imperialist settlement in the But Botha cannot win at the negotiating table what he failed to win on the South Africa's attempt to Cuban Angola into expelling its the Lubango line in failed at And although SWAPO suffered a serious setback in Angola, its forces are fighting on in Namibia, as they have been fighting for the past 18 years.

Diplomacy will not resolve the conflicts between the apartheid regime and black Africa.

South Africa's military might will only give it a respite from the growing wrath of the African masses outside and Andy Clarkson the next step, March 1984 19

In the shadow of the bourgeoisie Punch lampoons the physical force Chartists Theodore Rothstein , From Chartism to Labour ism, Lawrence and Wishart 1983, pp365, pbk £6.95 THE REPUBLICATION OF Theodore Rothstein's 1929 classic work on the early British labour movement is to be welcomed.

of print, From Chartism to Labourism spans the period from the birth the OL proletarian movement in the 1830s to the defeat of the working class in the First World wat peciite

ITS

wen nesses. analysis of Chartism and his account of the birth of the labour bureaucracy in the heyday of British imperialism is well worth reading.

Theodore Rothstein

HIYCE

process whieh ne later attempted to make sense of. Hence, while his insights are often illuminating, his analysis reflects the weaknesses of the socialist movement in which he played a full part. A refugee from Tsarist Russia, Rothstein came to England in 1891. He immediately threw himself into political activity, joining the Hackney and Kingsland branch of the Social Democratic Federation in 1895. Rothstein and his wife Anna were the mainstays of the group

TINOBE

anu-moenast

SDF.

They challenged the chauvinistic stance of SDF leader H M Hyndman during the Boer War. In the years up to 1914 the Rothsteins fought a consistent battle against the strong social chauvinist current within labour movement. When war broke out in 1914 Rothstein adopted an uncompromising When the British Socialist anti-war position. Partv formed in 1911 from the remnants of the SDF, took an equivocal stance, Rothstein resigned. Rothstein was a prolific writer. He edited and contributed to numerous socialist journals and pamphlets before the First World War, including the central organ of the German Social Democratic Party, Neue Zeit, and the more leftwing Leipziger Volkszeitung.

He conducted an infrequent but friendly corespondence with When the. Bolsheviks started their daily paper Pravda in 1912, Rothstein became its London corespondent. Ater the so snevik 1917 Rothstein became revolution in official Soviet representative in Britain.

played a major part in the 'Hands off Russia' campaign and in the long prelude to the formation of the British Communist Partv. Ir August 1920 he left for the Soviet Union where he lived and worked until his death in 1953.

Rothstein emphasises that the factors which led to the defeat of Chartism decisively influenced the class struggle in Britain for the next half century and more. Rothstein's book has four strengths. First, it his assessment oi the Chartist movement is more limited in scope than more recent studies, Rothstein's grasp of The cass strugge is more masive secona se has a clear appreciation of the importance of Chartism as the first independent working class Third, his recognition of the movement. strength of the bourgeoisie and the weakness of working class politics informs his explanation Finally, while his ol une movement s talure.

understanding of the process through which the labour bureaucracy was integrated into the state in the last quarter of the nineteenth century is macomolete u supasses mose studies of the period. Sounding the tocsin In a sense, the Chartist movement dates not from the 'Six Points' of the People's Charter in 1838, but from the moment the 1832 Reform Bill received the Royal Assent.

The capitalist class won its decisive victory over the landed aristocracy with the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846. But the 1832 Reform Bill handed the bourgeoisie the reins of power. While the Bill secured only a modest extension of the vote (initially from 435 000 to 652 000 electors) it ensured that the interests of the industrial bour- 20 the next step, March 1984 geoisie would thenceforth be decisive.

there was no mistaking 1832. The reformed introduced the hated 1834 Poor Law, sanctioned the transportation of the Tolpuddle labourers in 1834 and launched the struggle to break the nascent general trade unions.

There is a direct connection between 1832 and the rise of Chartism. Once in power, the bourgeoisie set its face against further reform.

The working class, which had gained nothing from its alliance with the middle class reformers, continued the struggle for democratic rights under the banner of the People's Charter.

Chartism, which reached its peak in the early 1840s, broucht together movements, From the anti-Poor Law agitation, to the Plug riots of 1842, to the struggle for a 10 hour day, the vitality of the movement was immense. that it was the first attempt by class to estabusi an mdependem powacal party.

For the more radical working class sections of the Chartist movement the vote was but a means to an end. preached the gospel of universal suffrage from the pages of The Poor Man's Guardian, he first argued that the working class would not be free until it had destroyed the rule of capital: 'All reforms in Church and State which did Kotnstemn s not go to emancipate the labourer from the tyranny of Capital would be useless, or worse than useless to the working class...As long as through the the labourer's existence capital of others, so long must he continue a pauper and a slave...There is but one remedy.

It is to upset the whole system.

reforming it by parts. While the moral force wing of the Chartist movement led by William Lovett was prepared and compromise to colaborate class radicals, the physical force school led by Feargus O'Connor, Ernest Jones, George Julian Harney and Bronterre O' Brien maintained a within the rigorous independence. By 1848, Chartism was all but dead. Most historians attribute its demise to leadership quarrels. problems in the immaturitv of the working the British class and working class politics.

tal revolutions of 1848 marked the awakening of the European working class. In England, 84mtked the After the demoralising failure of the Chartist demonstration at Kensal Moor on 10 April the bourgeoisie moved in to smash the Chartist movement by eliminating its leaders.

Rothstein argues, the movement had already foundered. immature for the development of consistently revolutionary working Clas. organisation. year 1848 signified the defeat of une independent polities in Britain. For the next 50 years and more, the working class was to walk in the the shadow of bourgeois ideology, political domination of the Liberal Party: It was a blow from which the revolutionary movement in England did not recover for generations and to this day the English bourg.

eoisie is enjoying the fruits of its victory in 1848 True, this was not the only conquest which has sustained the English bourgeoisie; even more brilliant and important was the subsequent victory on the ideological front by means of economic and political concessions timely which gradually reconciled the working class to the capitalist order and fastened around its neck the yoke of bourgeois ideology. But even this second victory was rendered posible only as a result of the first, which had broken the revolutionary backbone of the proletariat, and made the working class soft and pliable in the hands of its artful conquerors.

The roots of opportunism Rothstein describes the last quarter of the nineteenth as CEntuL stagnation tor the British abour movement.

The period was characterised by a repudiation of class politics and a narrow concentration on trade unionism. ments the integration of the trade union leaders into the state apparatus. He details the careers of John Burns, Keir Hardie and Ben Tillett, from trade union militants to staid establishment figures. He describes the development of consultation procedures and an elaborate machinery of arbitration and conciliation.

Rothstein is unable to provide a convincing explanation of how bourgeois ideology came to exert such an influence reviews And within the working class the new tone after House of Commons ure sTate. a waole Tanee But Chartism's real significance was the working While Bronterre O Brien predominance ol depends upon the Imperialism. There is no with middle consequences. 'aristocratic the Rothstein locates the movement's fails to grasp the intricate The continenclass leadership of the labour retreat of the proletariat.

working class. 1900 the but as complete aTOSE British capitalism was still too theory working class organisation and class a working under the movement. Grenada: destabilisation, pp164, pbk £3.95 £6.95 of Grenada by 6000 American period of political to the island from the USA.

Rothstein meticulously docu- Jewel Movement. dramatically appeared in the shops. What nowevel, is to plans. workers. Rothstein correctly points to the strength and highly developed class consciousness of the British bourgeoisie. He shows how the political skill and sagacity of the ruling class fostered the incorporamon ol mne abour oureaueacy mute The Six Points

PEOPLE'S

CHARTER.

hav aue mulid. a vuro for etery ma puneny one rar, nf ape, of soand his . Tes. BALior - To protet the elector in the exercise of 3. en tong the gonirenn for Mem the manoi the of Grenada expected. n ld ehy a coiniten year (ever But Rothstein makes two mistakes. First he rejects the thesis that it was the unrivalled British imperialism alone Although Which allowed the bourgeoisie to make concessions to certain sections of the working class Significantly, Rothstein never refers to Lenin's Rothstein contends that it was medipros which astuaged the distes o amom the working class, blunted its militancy against the employers, and promoted and consolidated the policy of opportunism with all its logical Second, distinguish between the leaders of the labour movement, who were drawn closer and closer embrace' via tactor inspectorships and seats on the Board of Trade, and the working class which gained little from Rothstein the triumph of British imperialism.

process by which the highly skilled, craft sections of the working the labour aristocracy - assumed the movement

TWEK

through the mediation of these labour leaders tnat bourgeois ldeology was transmittea to tne With the formation of the Labour Party in alliance consummation the ol between the labour leaders and the state was ame traomentea organisations outside Labour's orbit were too weak politically to challenge Labour's influence.

The upsurge of working class militancy before the First World War and the challenge it posed to the labour bureaucracy seemed to offer the glimmer of hope But the unofficial revolt failed to transcend the narrow confines of spontaneous strike action.

Still in the shadow of the bourgeoisie, thousands of workers lined up behind the bosses to defend Britain in the imperialist war, sent to their slaughter by the patriotic leaders of the labour Joan Phillips under the heel invasion, Chris Searle, Grenada: the struggle against Writers Readers 1983, Fitzroy Ambursley and Robin Cohen eds, Crisis invasion. in the Caribbean, Heinemann 1983, pp276, pbk THE INVASION OF the tiny Caribbean island troops last October had long been predicted. Chris Searle's book, published after the invasion but written warning. before, is concerned primarily with the threat Searle gives an

SIES

anecdotal account of Grenada under the New His failure to analyse the movement leads Searle to predict the survival of the New Jewel regime in Grenada, an assertion refuted even before his book Crisis in the Caribbean explains some of the background to the invasion. The articles in this collection point to some of the common problems facing Caribbean regimes committed to independent economic development. Fitzroy Ambursley's chapter on Grenada describes the frustration of the New Jewel government's Ambursley points out that the new regime was concerned to avoid a showdown with imperialism and simply wanted to encourage foreign capitalists to contribute more to the The New Jewel development of the island government enlisted foreign capital to build the Point Salines airport to try to expand the island's tourist industry. But it could not promote the development of agriculture or Grenada's industrial base Foreign capitalists wère not interested in building factories on such a small island, with almost no skilled Even the workers needed to build the airport had to be shipped in from Cuba and The state was too poor te omer countes. This failure to promote much development.

make economic progress prompted the power struggle between Prime Minister Maurice Bishop and his deputy Bernard Coard which developed during the summer of 1983. While the struggle remains obscure, it is clear that both were keen The dispute was over how to achieve this. The overthrow of Bishop and the establishment of military rule in Grenada provided the USA with an excuse to The USA needed a victory to recover its standing as a military power. US president Reagan was confident that the marines would get a quick and favourable result in Grenada He predicted that thev would be in and ou within a week. Into oblivion It is a measure of US decline that the invasion as Reagan was not as simple Fierce resistance from the islanders Cuban prevented the marines

WOTK C

from taking full control for nearly a week.

month after the invasion there were still 4000 troops on the island mopping up" More than 1000 US troops now form part of a permanent garrison on the island. The occupying forces face serious problems.

there no organised TesistaneE movement, the islanders have developed tactics to irritate the invaders.

People report that arms, or Cuban soldiers, are hidden in inaccessible parts of the island's hills. When the troops get there they find nothing.

Marines recently shot a flock of bats they disturbed when entering a cave in search of a Cuban 'cell'.

Clearly the USA cannot rely on the 'gratitude" of the islanders. Maurice Bishop: victim of imperialism A more pressing problem for the USA is how to establish some form of political framework for Grenada. After the invasion the USA appointed Governor General Paul Scoon as nca oi mesa scovere scooa anaBs American backers confront serious problems in trying to hold elections on the island.

Eric Gairy, who ruled the island before the New Jewel Movement ousted him in the 1979 coup, returned to Grenada in January.

Gairy is remembered as a brutal puppet of the USA.

But apart from the New Jewel Movement, which has begun to reorganise itself after the Gairy's Grenadian United Labour rarty is the only polltical grouping on the island prepared for an election. The USA needs to hold elections on the island to justify its But a Gairy victory or a win for the NJM would be embarrassing. Scoon's team has reluctantly promised elections in November Despite the local difficulties, the USA achieved its broad objectives from the invasion of Grenada. Opponents of US policy in Central America and the Caribbean took note of the Nicaragua's Sandinista government, itself facing US backed guerrillas operating on northern border, quickly adopted conciliatory approach to the USA.

For the USA the invasion of Grenada has served its purpose. In the words of one official, Grenada *is now sinking gradually into the oblivion we reserve for our friends'. For a time the people of Grenada were, at the centre of the confrontation between imperialism and the masses of Now they have been consigned Tae ocd to the oblivion of misery and military repression that imperialist countries reserve for people of the Third World under pro-Western dictatorships.

John Johnson

Jesse Jackson: frustrated Democrat Inside black America Manning Marable, How capitalism underdeveloped black America, Pluto Press 1983, Pp343, pbk £5.95 MANNING MARABLE is a prominent American academic. Last year he left the National Black Independent Political Party to become vicechairman of the new Democratic Socialist Party, a predominantly white liberal coalition.

claims to have written 'a revolutionary critique of the integral social classes that constitute the national minority or nation' of black Americans.

Marable ouflines the various solutions put forward by middle class blacks in response to their oppression. But he refuses to recognise that all of them have been compatible with the interests of the ruling class. In the 1960s racial segregation in the southern states was becoming a costly business which threatened to unleash social upheaval. The Rockefellers and the Kennedys used Martin Luther King to front a desegregation campaign which opened up new outlets for business investment.

T Washington's 'Separate but Equal' compromises with white businessmen in the late nineto the national separatism of coonun century. Marcus Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association in the 1920s, to King's calls for integration, the independent interests of black workers have been jettisoned by the collaborationist approach of the black middle class.

The politics of impotence Today the black activists of the seventies have settled for a utopian dream of socialist transformation in the future, while accommodating to the system in the present. Marable's democratic socialist turns out to be a frustrated Democrat.

Marable may not back black Democratic Party hopeful Jesse Jackson's blatant presidential support for American imperialism. But nor will he condemn him. Marable's criticism Jackson's Coca Cola boycott to force company to employ blacks is that it didn't The work. real problem with Jackson's approach is that it doesn't seek to mobilise the working class - black and white - against racism. Reading the British press it would seem that most black Americans are running for Mayor - Harold Washington in Chicago, Andrew Young Wilson Goode in Philadelphia.

In Atlanta. The reality is different. American blacks suffer racial violence and oppression on a scale unknown even in racist Britain. The proportion of blacks permanently out of work has risen from eight percent in the mid sixties to more than 20 per cent today. Racial polarisation has reached the point where sheriffs lead posses to carry out legal lynchings.

The role of black middle class politicians is to undermine black It was Andrew Young who headed off mass protests against the random killings of black youth in Atlanta. It was Harold Washington along with Jesse Jackson's PUSH (People United to Serve Humanity, who attempted to crush a city-wide school strike in Chicago last October. Marable is unable to offer any defence against the attacks which he documents.

reflects the discontent of intellectual, middle class America Because he is black in a viciously racist society he aspires to a world where all will be equal. But Marable doesn't even believe in his own utopia. He sees racism as something eternal which will have to be combatted under socialism too.

As for black and white working class unity, Marable feebly calls for white labour to 'engage in extensive self-criticism'. Marable's politics and the social group they represent are incapable of defending American blacks from the wholesale oppression they suffer, Zaro Costello Isolating the Irish War Tom Garvin, The evolution of Irish nationalist politics, Gill and pp244, pbk £7.50 John Darby ed, Northern Ireland: the background to the conflict, 1983, pp272, pbk £4.95 Flackes, directory, Ariel Books BBC 1983, Pp 323, pbk €3.95 ALTHOUGH they deal with different parts of Irish history and geography, Garvin's book and the essays edited by Darby share some common ground. today can be understood without reference to the 'British connection'.

Garvin makes some useful observations on the changing face of Irish nationalism from the eighteenth century up to the Tan War of 1919- But when that war ends, Garvin's problems begin. He assumes that the Twenty-six Counties Free created

STATE

independent Irish nation.

occupation of the North and today's IRA thus fall outside his terms of reference.

Garvin into confusion. He ponders over which "model" applicable to the South. But the peculiarity of the Twenty-six Counties is not covered by standard academic categories. Partition and the direct domination of the Six Counties have allowed British imperialism to indirect domination of the South details the way British influence shaped the He institutions of the Twenty-six Counties state, but dismisses this as a 'hangover' from colonial days. Yet British influence in the South is a modern reality, Garvin attempts to analyse Irish nationalism outside the context of Anglo-Irish relations. By endorsing the British view independent he denies the national character of today's war in the Six Counties. The 'model' Garvin needs to understand the Twenty-six Counties is Lenin's analysis domination. Irish nationalism is still evolving in the struggle against that domination and for selfdetermination. From Booker Border patrol: Britain's dividing line Northern Treland: the background to the conflict shares all of Garvin's problems but none of his merits. to the collection of essays establishes that it is only concerned with the internal politics of the Six Counties. and British troops on Irish streets amount to an 'external dimension' which is not central to an understanding of Northern Ireland. All the contributors portray the British state as a neutral institution which can play a progressive role in changing the North's 'sectarian relations.

Only Bill Rolston's piece on reformism and sectarianism dismisses the idea that Britain seeks to combat sectarianism. Rolston sees a major barrier to British reforms as the 'technocracy which administers the system. Rolstechnocracy' is better known as the ton's British state. reforming British politicians, ensures the continuation of the institutionalised sectarianism on which British rule in the Six Counties rests. By ignoring the crucial issue of British oppression and blaming He Irish extremism for the war, the contributors to Darby's collection interference in Irish affairs.

W D Flackes' Northern Ireland: a political directory also isolates the Six Counties from its political context. But here, that isolation is the book's strength. academic analysis, Flackes presents a rigorous catalogue of the facts, faces and places in the Irish War. His revised work is an invaluable aid to those more interested in what goes on in the Six Counties than in what goes on in the minds of sociology lecturers. Macmillan Dublin 1983, Appletree Press Belfast Northern Ireland: a political Both assume that events in Ireland . The Border, Britainn Partition The long arm of the law Police and This leads of bourgeois sociology or politics is people maintain an ponce £1.50 Garvin Carolyn Steedman, pp215, pbk £8.95 not an historical oddity.

that Ireland is pok £3.95 of imperialist control. restore support for the police. the introduction of and John Darby's introduction Direct Kule from Westminster class. the twentieth century. of various government agencies.

its victims,

HOT

only Coereon can Brixtons and Toxteths. Whatever the subjective wishes of state repression'. years of this prescription, condone further British emphasis on the ideology

COTTON

Free from the confusions of British society. in the working class. mitigate racial oppression.

Eddie Veale Louise Christian, Policing by coercion, GLO committee support unit, pp223, pb Victorian Policing the community, Routledge & Kegan Paul 1984, Harris Joshua & Tina Wallace, To ride the storm, Heinemann 1983, pp221, pbk £6.95 Paul Gordon, White Law: racism in the police courts and prisons, Pluto Press 1983, pp159, Policing by coercion is the fruit of Louise Christian's research for the GLC's police committee on the Police and Criminal Evidence Bill.

It gives a concise account of the new powers explanation enshrined in the Bill, now passing through the committee stage en route to the statute book.

his own story. Christian is concerned to prove that the Police Bill is based on 'a philosophy of coercion and diary. , not of consent. Labour's campaign for democ ratic control of the police rests firmly on this assumption. For the Labour left, accountability is not just a procedural constitutional matter, but the "basis on which consent for the exercise of police power is secured'. The accountability lobby has found sustenance in the notion that the police force was established under popular Only democratic accountability can local control and win back public Carolyn Steedman's book on the formation of English provincial police forces in the middle years of the nineteenth century is a refutation of this thesis. Steedman shows how the police force was introduced to deal with a growing working class. The landowning gentry resisted modern policing as an encroachment upon its traditional prerogatives.

But the industrial bourgeoisie, which needed a more effective method of curbing working class unrest, prevailed. One of the first exponents of police "professionalism' Major General William Cartwright wanted to see 'a wholesale system of

THE

disciplining communities. Written from a pro-police standpoint, Steedman's book exposes the police as an instrument of class rule, abhorred by the Victorian working She graphically conveys the extent of working class resistance to the introduction of the new police force which continued well into To ride the storm deals with the 1980 riot.

in Bristol. It analyses the responses of the legal system, the role of the media and the reactions The authors aim is to prove that the growing authoritarianism of the state benefits neither the establishment black youth: Increasing provoke more Bristols, They end by citing community policing advocate John Alderson: There has to be a better way than blind Their alternative, which the state has put into practice over the last two years, is more consultation and liaison between the police and the black community. After two blacks are more isolated and vulnerable than ever before.

Paul Gordon's White Law is defined by its bodies of of racism'. with Joshua and Wallace, Gordon plague. deplores the 'ingrained popular racism Like them, he dismisses the potential for building an anti-racist movement Because they reject the working class as the only social force which has an interest in fighting racism, these concerned liberals are forced to rely on the racist state to Colin Brown Lest darkness come Charles Maclean, The Watcher, Penguin Books 1984, pp333, pbk £1.95

"SENSATIONAL,

and deeply SHOCK nO disturbing, The Watcher will take you to the brink of madness' is the warning on the advertising blurb for Penguin's latest bestseller.

Insomniac Paul Newman read it and stopped sleeping altogether. 'Not a book for bedtime" advised Piers Paul Read. The Watcher has received rave reviews on both sides of the Atlantic. It riveted the reviewers, but none of them could seem to make sense of it. Publishers' Weekly announced that it 'defies categorisation'.

The Good Housekeeping reviewer was hypnot ised", 'spellbound' and haunted for two sleepless nights and many waking moments'.

found it original, horrific and compulsively gripping. Why? When 33 year old Martin Gregory leaves the office-where he works as a computer sales executive on the eve of his wife's birthday his nightmare begins. He prepares a surprise for his wife - a present wrapped in a white box - sc shocking that it defies explanation.

Nearby he leaves the message Out of their misery. From the moment of Martin Gregory's breakdown the reader is taken on a journey into the mind of a very ordinary man on the verge of fragmentation. Middle class nightmare The Watcher is a contemporary journey into the heart of darkness, the story of a man sc consumed by an overwhelming sense of guilt that he can carry on only by making a total break with reality. At the beginning of the novel, Gregory's psychiatrist Dr.

Somerville tells us that: If one can only discover where to look, there is an explanation for everything".

But the reader's desire to discover a rational for Gregory's breakdown constantly frustrated./ Maclean's manipulation of the reader is perfect. Martin Gregory tells We also read extracts from his But we also read Dr Somerville's reports on his sessions with the patient and the transcripts from the tape recordings of Gregory's regressions under hypnosis. All yield conflicting explanations for Gregory's actions.

Maclean opens the door, only to close it again.

Maclean's novel is not merely a virtuoso portrayal of obsession and madness. The cause of Gregory's psychosis is never made explicit.

clear.

SHOVELS

WATCHER

"ORIGINAL, HORRIFIC

AND COMPULSIVELY GRIPPING'

-SUNDAY EXPRESS

CHARLES MACLEAN

renguin chiller neads the bestsellers Gregory's world is a world without hope. Man is inherently destructive and the world is an inational place of war, famine and disease.

The massive burden of guilt which Gregory bears is for all of suffering humanity.

In his nightmare visions of chaos and destruction, certain images recur: torrential rain, storms, flood, and the innocent children corrupted by The Watcher suggests that man can transcend the ignominy of modern civilisation only by pursuing an individual quest for truth.

Gregorv's flight trom reality expresses the middle class fear and revulsion at the anarchy and war unleashed by the capitalist system.

This is what makes it compulsive reading for every petit-bourgeois individual engulfed by the horrors of the modern world.

Joan Phillips the next step, March 1984 21

Letters On 2 December 28 year labourer Tommy Quigley was selzed by a joint scotland Yard and

RUC

snatch squad Andersonstown, West Belfast. Tommy Quigley was flown to London and detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act at Paddington Green police station 'in connection with the IRA's 1981 London bombing campaign. While bulletproof police patrolled jackets Paddington Green, the Irish Freedom Movement held daily

STORSE

pickets. On Thursday 8 December we demonstrated outside Maryle. bone Magistrates Court when Tommy Quigley was charged conspiracy cause explosions. A week later, the IPM organised a national day of centred a march around Brix ton Prison where Tommy Quigley is being held.

Below reprint nIs the Irish Freedom letter to Movement. Dear Irish Freedom Movement, Thank you for your letter and It was much apprecsupport. iated and very welcomed. I was On 24 March I will be performing a sponsored parachute jump on behalf of the Irish Freedom Movement. have decided to give the IFM my backing in this because or its consisten and uncompromising record of solidarity with the Irish liberation struggle. Its record of support for Irish freedom fighters, prisoners of war and those detained under the Prevention o1 errorism Act, has been exemplary in winning British workers to the cause of Irish freedom and self determination.

I personally know what that does

SUBDOIL

means • my family. We have had ample experience of the Prevention of Terrorism Act. I have been interrogated 11 detained and times since its The Irish Freedom Movement and its predecessor the Smash the Prevention of Terrorism Act Campaign have Glasgow newspapers are trying to turn a current dispute into a sexist joke. Life models at Glasgow School of Art are fighting for improved conditions and pay. he Irst stage in the action is a ban on modelling nude. the naked human 'art", form is idealised and exalted.

What a contrast with the humil iation and degradation suffered by art Students' models, forced to pose nude for nours on enc cold and dirty classrooms!

in Models are rewarded with aches, pains, potential arthritis £62 per week. Life models at the Glasgow School of Art decided to change Their fight for a £115 weekly wage is the first the local acton to challenge authorities" derisory three per cent pay offer. The transport 22 the next step, March 1984 Freedom lepp Irish prisoner speaks surprised and heartened by your picketing outside the court, especially the first day when I was taken from Paddington Green. It was good to know that I had not been condemned the whole population England. From what I had just seen that morning in the papers it seemed that my trial was over and they had already found me guilty. The only thing that I am guilty of, is of course the fact that Irish, and any Irishman will do they when I hope the need a showtrial. much coverage

BLOSS

AVES

when I prove my innocence as they did when I was kidnapped from my own country. At the minute I have settled in and I am keeping my spirits high. I'm still going to court every week, which seems to be greatly annoying the cops tor I'm also pressing some reason. them to nave the trial as soon as possible, and they are trying to delay it for as long as they can.

They know I have nothing to fear in court and their only hope is that anti-rish feeling will convict me, but unfortunately for them I can quite easily Leap for Irish freedom been at the forefront of the fight against my detentions.

I have chosen this time to back the campaign to highlight the introduction of the new permanent Prevention of Terrorism Bill. The Bill means only one thing increased terror against Irish people in Britain.

1 therefore urge all of you, inside and outside the

DOLA

British labour movemen! sponsor my great leap for Irish freedom as generously as possible. fighting Help bulld a campaign to smash the Prevention of Terrorism Act and drive Britain out of Ireland once and for all. Peter Grimes ex-POW, Britain (Rush sponsorships to BM IFM, London WCIN 3XX. MaKe cheques and postal orders pay able to IrM) It's no joke workers' union nationally have rejected this offer in words, but have done nothing to fight for any improvement. The Transport and General Workers' Union steward for the life models explained the situation: wrue the unton leaders are sitting round the negotiating table, many manual workers like us are taking nome wages vou can't survive on. We decided we could not wait. We drew up our own wage claim based on what we need to live on and what we considered decent working conditions. We do the job so we We presented our claim to the TGWU asking for automatic backing and to the GSA demanding

TECTER CETTECTLE

immediate response. Manage- The TGWU ment delayed. asked us to postpone our action prove 1 am innocent. Your conference sounds really good and very interesting I hope to hear more about it.

I read in the paper about Shef field council's decision.

I was a little surprised and a bit disapointed but sooner or later the will across. Hessagt get wonder will they ban your demonstration on 3 March I hope you will understand if I don't make it in person, but I will be thinking of you and will look forward to hearing all about it. I'm hoping soon to get some papers from home. 1 get very little news from Ireland except what little there is in the English press, and after reading these English papers I can understand why most of the people next to nothing nere

KNOW

about the situation at home.

Well, I'll sign off now. hope everything goes well with your plans for the future, and I look forward to hearing WIll from you. All the best Tommy Quigley 'A' section Brixton Prison Winning strength I went along to the Preparing for Power dayschool in Bradford on 11 February. I really enjoyed the discussions - and I got a lot out of them. In the morning Frank Richards talked about the Labour Party and the so-called lefts. In the afternoon Kate Marshall spoke about what the mean for the working class today. She made me realise what the unions are really up to. I think what the RCP is doing is really positive.

The dayschool really made me think about reformist politics that have been hanging around for years without gaining anything for the working class. It also gave me practical arguments I can use in everyday struggles.

think the RCP has the politics to win the class struggie.

Sarah Leach Bradford indefinitely management's behalf. We said no way. Our action goes on. Under pressure

TGWU

workers the promised to give their publicly action full backing. But the TGWU has also given management private assurances that it won't support the dispute.

Already the workers have the support of the student body at the Glasgow School of Art and of 17 art-school models in Management have threatened to sack any models who don't work normally but with increased support and continued determination, the models their claim and overcome attempts union officials and the tabloid press to undermine their action.

Sue McNeil Glasgow Nude protest Hackney Labour council may be a racist landlord (the next step, February), but it's also a sum landlord and a union-bashing Tenants on the estate where I work in Hoxton welcomed the setting up 10 months ago of an area base for housing repairs and services.

We thought it would speed up repairs and services. But the office workers in the base had to send the job tickets to the town hall to be processed and the repairs seemed to take even longer get done. Shop to stewards and tenants represen tatives asked for mote local control, but what we got was more managers and supervisors.

frustration and anger, decided to take action to short all the delays. and CIrCUIL excuses Tenants and BTOs (Building I read with interest your article on the war between Iran and Iraq (the next step, February).

I though it a pity that you were unable to dwell on the way the Khomeini regime is attempting off the to play imperialist powers against each other.

The Khomeini regime in Iran is hoping to win international respectability. The official organ of the ruling party Peykan admits its regret at neglecting the "international' aspect of the revolution. Settling debts with the USA is an important part of this process. But the decline of America and the relative dynamism of other powers, espec- Sperm control suggest that the latest Pill scare part of the ruling class strategy sexual Cacolate restraint (the next step, Febru- But I wonder why you all. don't raise the whole question of the sexism inherent in what is known as Birth Control. Why is it never called Sperm Control?

Why doesn't the RCP emphasise that if contraception is an issue for the whole working class then it must be something that men too concern themselves with?

There is a lot of researc being done on a safer contraceptive for women as this would Jealous of WAR There has been a lot in the news recently about racism Birmingham Labour Party. It's all true, 1 have been a member of Small Heath Labour Party since last August. I joined hoping to change it trom the Some Asians had formed inside. ates forward for councillors But it didn't work, the names never got short-listed. the about positive action for blacks, the Labour Party's too scared of losing white votes to make a move, Although they do nothing Pillscare Slum landlord Trades Operatives) moved in and occupied area base, workers are bullding angry the council's 2 SO preferential policy of plumbing, electrical and carpen try work out to private tender.

We set about issuing our own job tickets and sorting out all the outstanding repairs with whatever materials we could get hold of. As soon as the councillors realised that they Cold legally charged for this work, they did every ung in then power to smash the occupation They tried to get us to sign doc uments accepting responsibility for the work done. This meant that we would be culpable for anything that went wrong.

The council decided tc the Day men's wages, but not the shop stewards. Labour councillors Khomeini enemy of the West? ially Japan and West Germany, has given the Iranian regime scope for manoeuvre.

SO ISE

Khomeini feels free to denounce the USA while publicly welcoming other representanves imperialist powers into Iran.

Khomeini plays on the hatred the Iranian masses still feel for the USA because of its support for the Shah, He has prostituted anti-imperialism into anti-American showbusiness to cover up his own cosy relations with the imperialist powers.

Samad London I think Jenny Graham is right to obviously be extremely profitable for the company that discovered it. But the drug com panies are reluctant to develop contactives lose because of men's attitude. Many men think of vasectomy as on par and hormone with castration, pills as emasculating. Few men would put up with the discomfort of an 'Intra-Penile Device' if one were invented. So yes, let's 'demand the Pill or better', but that "better' ought to include an advance on the sheath tormen Susie Watson Wandsworth themselves, the Labour Party is very jealous of other people's Local MPs like Roy campaigns, and Dennis Howell do tnel best to try and under.

mine WAR's work, fortunately without success. I'm resigning from the Labour Party It's too bureaucratic and does nothing for black people. I'm working with WAR because it means what it says and gets something done.

Pervase Small Heath Birmingham sent senior housing officials to smasn unel way into a repal depot early one morning after we had occupied it the night before. When we read some of the documents we found there, we leansed wny they were sc keen to act quickly. The documents revealed evidence of cor ruption - we are seeking legal advice about what to do next Meanwhile have to face we battalions of supervisors and personnel officers before we can negotiate with the council.

The action of Hackney tenants and council workers alarmed the bureaucrats at the town hall We showed what could be done with real control over council services. Most of all we showed that council officials are a hindrance rather than a help when it comes to providing services for the community. The whole affair shows the emptiness of the council's rhetoric about 'serving the community. The Labour council has been preaching the gospel of decentralisation Hackney workers ever since the last elections. It promised more effective services and more democratic control. But I think people are beginning to realise what a sham it all is. As the council's patronising and insulting poster put it: Hackney people are getting a bum deal' - a bum deal from the Labour Party. What the council really means by decentralisation is more local control by it over us. the workers and tenants on the estates. As soon as we start taking real control Labour will stop at nothing to divide and attack us. An angry BTO Hoxton, East London Berlin terror I was very interested to read about the struggle against the racists by immigrant workers in Poissy (the next step, February).

But the racist violence Gareth Evans wrote about is not conlined to france Most people must have read about the six prisoners who burned to death in a Berlin prison while awaiting deportation. What people don't know is that tragedies like this happen regularly. In September 1982 about 30 prisoners awaiting deportation tried to commit suicide together in one of Berlin's humiliating prisons. Last year prisoners were forced to linger in cramped, squalid jails for nearly a year waiting to be deported. What lies behind this is a repressive and racist policy that has gone on for years.

Berlin's growing squads of immigration police are regularly briefed to round up foreig- These foreigners are then Hers. put in overcrowded prison cells or flown back to their country of origin Hundreds of people from Sri Lanka have already had this experience. I very much hope the next step keeps up its good work in exposing the attacks on im migrant workers in Europe and at home. Monica Wegerer West Berlin

Meetings

LEEDS

A series of three meetings on women's oppression Wednesday 14 March Porn and prejudice: should we ban video nasties? Wednesday 21 March Does Leeds Labour Council fight for women's rights? Wednesday 28 March Dole snoopers in Leeds: women under attack For details of venue and times of meetings contact sellers of the next step or phone 01-274 3951. Creche facilities available. Baby sitting can be arranged (Goodge Street tube) 13 March • Bloodbath in Lebanon: when will the marines go back to Beirut?

20 March • Can Africans eat microchips?: investment and starvation in the Third World 27 March Dollars and Death Squads: war in Central America 3 April • The Allies fall out: the Western Alliance breaks up 10 April • Who elected Ronald Reagan as and the Third World War

ASHTON UNDER LYNE

Thursday 15 March 7.30 pm Bloodbath in Lebanon Albion Hotel, Penny Meadow

LIVERPOOL

Tuesday 27 March 7.30 pm Fight local government cuts AUEW Hall, Mount Pleasant page 2)

NAME.

ADDRESS

TEL

UNION/ORGANISATION ..

Women's liberation

CENTRAL LONDON

Thursday 1 March Prostitutes and policing Thursday 8 March and war Thursday 15 March Problems at work fight for women? Thursday 22 March Pills and medicine These Central Babysitting Burton 01-274 3951

NORTH LONDON

Islington Fieldway Crescent N5

SHEFFIELD

Friday 23 March 7.30 pm Sheffield ment, Bridge Street

HANDS OFF!

A series of five forums to discuss what drives the Western aggressors and how Western aggression is driving the Third World towards destruction. Every Tuesday at 7.30 pm, Room 1F, Polytechnic of Central London, Bolsover Street, WC1

BIRMINGHAM

BRADFORD

Subscribe to hext step Please send me the next step every month. I enclose a cheque/postal order for .

(Make cheques/postal orders payable to Junius Publications Ltd. For subscription rates see Send to Junius Publications, BCM JP Ltd, London WC1N 3XX ШУТ Four forums on women's oppression.

From Greenham to Armagh - women the unions politics women and forums will be introduced by revolutionary communist women, and will all take place at the Polytechnic of London Students' Union, Bolsover Street, WC1 at 7.30 pm.

available - phone Ann Wednesday 7 March 7.30 pm Fight for a woman's right to work no cuts in child care in Islington Central Library Small Hall, Fight for a woman's right to work Centre Against Unemploy- Wednesday 28 March 7.30 pm What is imperialism? Digbeth Civic Hall, Digbeth Wednesday 28 March 7.30 pm Fight for the right to fight!

The Star Pub, Westgate.

REVOUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY

CENTRAL LONDON

Thursday 8 March 7.30 pm IF activists meeting University of London Union, Malet Street, WC1 7 Afia

* •WAR®

Smash all Immieration controls!

THURSDAY 8 MARCH

• LONDON

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY

OPENING OF NEW CAMPAIGN CENTRE

RECEPTION FROM 12.30-2.30 at

• BIRMINGHAM

Evening meeting city centre

FRIDAY9 MARCH

• WOLVERHAMPTON

Lunchtime meeting at Polytechnic

• COVENTRY

Evening meeting city centre

SATURDAY 10 MARCH

MANCHESTER

Hulme Library, Hulme Walk, 2pm, music food - entertainment

ELWAR:

• Two brutal stabbings in East London in one week. One nearly proved fatal • Bengali families thrown out of squalid bed and breakfast hotels.

there by Tower Hamlets Labour Counci These are the issues Stop the strip searches! Political status now!

TELE LIBERATES WOMEN

«GLE LIBERATES IRELAND

Solidarity with the Armagh women Over the weekend of 9-12 March a delegation of revolutionary communist women is going to Armagh jail. Armagh is where captured republican women soldiers are imprisoned.

annually to show that we will not go along with the British state's attempts to criminalise Irish freedom fighters.

I LIVERPOOL

Thursday 15 March 7.30 pm Report back from Armagh Polytechnic Students' Union, Haigh Buildings Maryland Street Afia Begum campaign - national speaking tour

SUNDAY 11 MARCH

• BRADFORD

will stay: Scout Hut St Pauls Road Manningham 2 pm

MONDAY 12 MARCH

TUESDAY 13 MARCH

• CARDIFF

Students' Union Park Place 12.30 pm Sure rest pr Brunel Street

• BRISTOL

I BRIGHTON

247 7848 EastLondon WorkersAgainstRacism They were put AFZAL on

LONDON

Street, London E8 Join the REP! If you would like to join the Revolutionary Communist Party or would like to know more about our activities, publications and politics please write to

FIGHT BACK HIT

THE PARTY C

THE FUTUR

ROP

REVOLUTE

Activities Protests are organised

BRADFORD

Wednesday 14 March 1pm Report back from Armagh University of Bradford, Communal Building

• SOUTH AND WEST YORKSHIRE

Tour of factories, bus depots, hospitals Community Centre

WEDNESDAY 14 MARCH

Lunchtime meeting at University Evening meeting city centre More information from 01-274 2820 or WORKERS AGAINST RACISM is dealing with week in, week out. To get involved in ELWAR's campaign phone FAREKH 01-274 3951 write to ELWAR, c/o Box 22, 136 Kingsland High The General Secretary

BM RCP

London WIN 3XX or phone 01-274 3951 Kate Marshall will answer all enquiries by return of post. the next step, March 1984 23

Speak out for Irish freedomd March against bans on Irish solidarity!

irish Frator Movement

TROOPS OUT NOW!

SELE DETERG RATION!

next step

MON

Transport to Sheffield leaves on Saturday 3 March from: Harry Shaw cafe, Pool Meadow, Fairfax Street.

Students' Union, Sidney Building, Oxford Road.

10.00am St John's Lane, Liverpool 1.

Norfolk Gardens. 10.30am Leeds Trades Council Club, Savile Mount.

phone 01-274 3951 for details Freedo

MARCH AGAINST BANS ON IRISH

SOLIDARITY!

Against - Sheffield Labour council's ban on Irish meetings and demonstrations Against - The Tories' new Prevention of Terrorism Bill

SHEFFIELD SATURDAY 3 MARCH

Assemble: Caborn Corner, Carlisle Street (Spital Hill) Sheffield, 1 pm LONDON: 8.00am York Way, Kings Cross. COVENTRY: 10.00am

BIRMINGHAM:

10.30am Colmore Row. MANCHESTER: 10.30am Manchester Poly

LIVERPOOL:

BRADFORD:

10.45am GLASGOW: 7.30am George Square.

LEEDS:

CARDIFF: