The Next Step: No. 14, 11 April 1986

ULSTER LOYALISTS ON THE RAMPAGE

Britain's bootboys the nextstep Revolutionary Communist Party • 11 April 1986 • 30р

KICK

back See pages 6 and 7 Workers Against Racism replies to the MSC page 3 The oil price war page 8 Liverpool and Lambeth: the last act page 4 Stuff it, Murdoch! page 2 14

upert Murdoch's offer to hand over production a labour movement newspaper, as a solution to the Wapping dispute, is an insult to the 6000 workers he sacked. The fact that his offer has not been rejected out of hand by the print union leaders should set the alarm bells ringing. Brenda Dean's willingness to negotiate over Murdoch's stunt shows the face union leaders put saving

BROTE

securing jobs and union rights at News International. If Neil Kinnock and Norman Willis want a newspaper, that is their concern. But their eagerness for talks with Murdoch shows that they too are ready to make a the dispute deal to settle and themselves a paper, even if it means sacrificing jobs and union rights for print workers. The Wapping dispute is about reinstating the sacked workers and winning union recognition. It is time the union leaders started fighting for these demands.

Instead of leading a real fight against Murdoch, the union leaders have turned the strike into a campaign of token gestures. The Saturday night demonstrations are better than nothing - but what about the rest of the week? Symbolic protests may be good for morale but they put no real pressure on the employers.

That's why Murdoch is in a stronger position now than on the first day of the dispute. The union leaders are running the dispute as if the picket lines are their private domain. They have discouraged 'outsiders from picketing.

Instead mobilising maximum support, Brenda Dean and Tony Dubbins have put their faith in public opinion. But public opinion does not win industrial disputes. Indeed public opinion is moulded by the very employers the print workers are fighting against. The union leaders have also promoted a divisive approach to the dispute. During the first few weeks of the strike they The wave of attacks on the Royal Ulster Constabulary from the Loyalist community reveals the tensions between the British state and its traditional allies that have been unleashed by the Anglo-Irish agreement. The paradoxical feature of these conflicts is that they arise, not from any attempt by Britain to retreat from the Union and abandon the Loyalists, from its attempts strengthen British domination over Ireland and reinforce its drive to crush movement for national liberation (see pages 6 and 7). The Anglo-Irish agreement is designed to ratify the division of Ireland under British control and achieve closer coordination among the authorities in London, Dublin and Belfast in hunting imprisoning those who oppose these arrangements. To win approval from moderate nationalist representatives on both sides of the Border, the deal had to include token concessions to the Catholic community in the North. Hence Thatcher agreed to give Dublin politicians a consultative role in the affairs of Northern Ireland, and directed the RUC to halt provocative Loyalist marches through Catholic areas.

These concessions have inflamed the Loyalists and led to ugly confrontations 2• the next step • 11 April 1986 the next step Revolutionary Communist Party weekly • 11 April 1986 • No 14

MURDOCH'S OFFER

directed all the anger against the scabs in the electricians union. Instead of fighting the union leaders advocated Murdoch, expelling the EETPU from the TUC. They ignored the fact that the EETPU was not alone in scabbing. Lorry drivers in the

TGWU,

engineers in the AUEW and members of the NGA, Sogat and the NUJ are all crossing the Wapping picket lines.

It is not surprising war workers Have little confidence in the union leaders.

Thousands of jobs are being negotiated out of existence in Fleet Street. Dean and Dubbins are not even pretending to defend jobs. All they are negotiating a deal - any deal.

The workers against Murdoch while the conduct of the get dispute remains in the hands of Dean and Dubbins. To fight effectively, workers must have direct control over the conduct of the strike. We need strike committees that can organise action - action that relies on involving rather than excluding other sections of the labour movement.

The only way to win the strike is to take whatever steps his knees. Murdoch to gestures and appeals to public opinion are useless. Murdoch has all the resources of the government and the media, the courts and the police behind him and he is out to win. The only language that Murdoch understands is the language of force.

Print workers are being picked off at one paper after another. By establishing the principle that all jobs are sacred it is possible to unite all workers in the print industry in a common struggle. Today of workers are fighting on several fronts, one at a time, often against each other. To win Wapping we need to change the direction of the dispute so that it can become part of a united struggle of all print workers against all newspaper bosses. This is the only way that the Wapping strikers can inspire wider solidarity and win the support they deserve.

NO SURRENDER

between RUC officers and their Protestant neighbours, as well as the more familiar sectarian murders and arson attacks on Catholic homes. Given the reliance of Ulster Protestants on the British state to guarantee their privileged access to jobs, housing and social status, even a token modification of the terms of Anglo-Irish relations sends wave through the Loyalist ranks. This insecurity has been expressed in the official 'Ulster says no' campaign and in the activities of the the Loyalist gun gangs. As the marching season progresses, the British forces will try to reassure the Loyalists by stepping up repression of the nationalists. Despite the bitter words exchanged between lan Paisley and Tom King and the bricks and plastic bullets and flying in the Shankill Road, the Loyalists and the British forces march under the same Union flag when it comes to suppressing the struggle for Irish freedom.

That is why the Irish Freedom Movement will be campaigning in the coming against months the against all British plans for Ireland and for the immediate withdrawal forces, as the only way of ending the barbarities inflicted by paramilitary police and Loyalist paramilitary gangs. Publisher Revolutionary Communist Party, BM RCP, London WCIN 3XX ® copyright Printer Morning Litho Printers Ltd (TU), 439 North Woolwich Road, London E16.

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Circulation 01-729 3771. Newsdesk 01-729 3771. Correspondence to The Editor, the next step, BCM JPLTD, London WIN 3XX. ISSN 0144 350 X 11 April 1986. Registered as a newspaper at the Post Office.

LABOUR IN FULHAM

interested is cannot succeed are necessary to bring Half-hearted Fulham campaign. organised his Kinnock's recent speeches.

of insecurity office in North roots in the constituency.

was succeeded by Tory Martin tradition by cares for the community."

Anglo-Irish deal, of British both British people on council's housing families in bed divided society."

'SMILE, ITS A BY-ELECTION' - RAYNSFORD AND LIVINGSTONE

BRIDGE OVER THE

RIVER THAMES

t a Fulham press conference a candidate Nick Raynsford's likeness to Neil Kinnock. *Look at Nick's hair line, he said, it's following Neil's.' But the Raysford-Kinnock likeness goes beyond his receding hair line. Their political likeness has been the focus of Labour's Raynsford declared himself a total Kinnock, supporter', and campaign line with The Fulham by-election shows how Kinnock's Labour Party wants to colleague bridge the gap between yuppies and workers, reports Andrew Calcutt Decency, dignity and individual freedom were the Kinnock-style keynotes of Rayns- Agony ford's electioneering. Raynsiord also promoted himself as the only local candidate.

For 17 years he has lived in Cranbury Road SW6, one of Fulham's gentrified districts. In his supporters' windows the Labour stickers read "Nick Ransford lives here' - causing some confusion for social security snoopers.

When the March winds blew down the order. Alliance signboard above their temporary End Road, Raynsford compared their flimsy base with his own Raynsford became a Hammersmith and Fulham councillor in 1971. Veteran Labour right winger Michael Stewart held the seat from 1945 until he retired in 1979, when he Stevens whose death led to this week's by-election.

Fulham Labour Partystressed its 'unbroken' bringing Stewart of out retirement to vouch for Raynsford.

"He represents the real Labour tradition,' said Stewart. "He is a local man who knows and The Fulham community has changed extremist. since Stewart first went to Westminster. A middle class invasion has pushed house prices in trendy Fulham above £100 000.

A short walk from Raynesford's Harold Laski house headquarters, the Fulham Road a nice futon centre does a snoring-good trade. But Fulham's up-market transformation is far from complete. In Gibbs Green ward there is 26 per cent unemployment. There are 11 000 opposite. Hammersmith and Fulham waiting list, and 130 and breakfast accommodation. "Fulham", says Raynsford, is a

JAVE KOUKAE

Raynsford was chosen to bridge the divide. A Cambridge graduate, he has spent the last 10 years as director of a housing quango. His wife, Anne, is a part-time teacher at the local school attended by two of their children. All three young Raynsfords were born in the NHS West London hospital, now under threat. If we care about tomorrow', he says, 'we've got to care about the health service.' Raynsford is the caring yuppie. His concern about unemployment, housing and the health service is matched only by his interest in the arts. He is a strong supporter of Hammersmith's Riverside arts centre.

Protest singer Billy Bragg and classical guitarist John Williams were booked to support his campaign. I am a pragmatic radical, says Raynsford, but a professional describes him a natural as conciliator, whose stability would satisfy the middle class vote. He displayed his pragmatism and conciliatory skills when sharing a platform with Denis Healey and Ken Livingstone. The message was clear: the Kinnockites together could win Fulham and go on to form a government committed to social need' aunt Claire Rayner came to convince Fulham voters of Labour's commitment to the consumer. Ransford echoed her call for eggs to be sold in twos, and praised Fulham's Sands End food co-op for its services to old people. TV cops Jill Gascoine, Anna Carteret and Colin Welland went walkabout on Clem Attlee estate to proclaim Labour's commitment to law and Shadow home secretary Gerald Kaufman castigated the Tories for presiding over the worst crime wave this country has ever known', and revealed Labour's plans for discretionary crime prevention grants to householders. Six days after mounted police Wapping charged the demonstrators, Raynsford reaffirmed his support for the police: "At Catherine and Laura's school fair, the children stroking the police horse was one of the most memorable sights.'

Raynsford is unequivocal about the use of the law against workers — he supports it. He has spoken against secondary picketing, and laughs off the Tories' attempts to label him an Alliance candidate Roger Liddle could not fault him. He bemoaned 'Labour's evil Grant and Ted the likes of Bernie Knight", but had to admit that Raysford is man. According to Liddle the spectrum of Labour opinion has shifted to the left, isolating the party's moderates. In fact Raynsford's ascendancy is proof of the With Kinnock-Raynsford to the fore, the Labour Party appeals directly to the middle classes. This may help Labour win votes in places like Fulham, but what use is it to the working class?

TO THE CORE'

Racism

ETHNIC MONITORING ROW EXPLODES

The Manpower Services Commission is attacking Workers Against Racism for opposing ethnic monitoring in job centres. We spoke to War organiser Alex Farrell about the he recent two-week test of ethnic monitoring in 150 job centres sparked protest strike action by 700 union members, backedby Workers Against This shocked Steve Loveman, the Racism. Manpower Services Commission boss responsible for the race checks, into issuing circulars to employees and writing to the Workers His message? Against press. Racism is wrong — the race checks are anti- War organiser Alex Farrell told us racist. different. • Why is War fighting the race checks?

The only reason the government wants to know the race of benefit claimants or job

JAVE ROURKE

applicants is to deny them their rights.

Attempts to carry out race checks started in 1982, when the Nationality Act made many blacks second- and third-class citizens. The Tories plan to reorganise the welfare system in line with the Act - to deprive black people of equal rights to benefits. Of course that's not what the Tories are telling us.

But it's already under way. Black people produce passports in hospitals, have to doctors' surgeries and housing offices. A new immigration rule says that immigrants who want relations to join them have to prove that they'll be independent financially, with no claim to any benefits. Otherwise they won't be let in. That's what the checks are part of. And that's why we've fought them since they first surfaced.

FISHING

FOR

BLACKS

Just before 10pm on Friday 14 March Ade walked into work as usual. A black student at Hackney college, he spends his nights cleaning the British Telecom office in Newgate Street, City of London. Like his workmates - nearly all of them black Ade earns £67 for a week's work.

Two hours before Ade arrived that night, 36 police and immigration officers entered

'IT'S RACIST

ота DDR0

ALEX FARRELL PUTS THE CASE AGAINST THE RACE CHECKS TO JOB CENTRE STAFF • Why is the government trying to get them into job centres? They thought the job centres would be a soft touch — a backdoor route into the dole and social security offices, where the checks would really count. They tried the doles in 1982 and together with rank and file workers we beat them off.

They tried the doles again early this year.

Strikes at Toxteth and Thornton Heath saw them off again. So they went for the job the building and lay in wait.

When the cleaners clocked on, they were herded by security guards into the rest room, to face six armed with home immigration otticers office files on every worker.

'One by one they called out our names', says Ade, 'and asked each of us questions "How long have you been in the uke. country?" The questions were unimportant.

They had all the answers in front of them.

They just wanted to catch people out. Each interview lasted two minutes. After that they told you to go out, either through the lefthand door - back to work- - or through the right-hand door — to the police station and deportation."

RACIST LAWS

Ade was one of the lucky ones who went through the left-hand door. Nineteen of his Wood Street workmates were taken to police station and interrogated for up to 14 hours. Five were transferred to Latchmere Two have already made remand centre. office calls 'voluntary what the home departures from Britain. One is being ОВСБІ

HOURS OF BUSINES

centres - traditionally less militant and with less workers in the union.

They went for a two-week test at 150 job centres. We contacted as many as possible and put pickets on where we got the best response from union members. Workers refused to operate the scheme at job centres Hackney, Leeds and Fulham. Those boycotting the scheme were suspended without pay. By the end of the test period over 700 Civil and Public Services Associaforcibly deported this week, and two cases are still 'under consideration'. All the others arrested have been charged with 'overstaying' or 'working in breach of conditions'.

They are due to appear in court. All are likely to be deported. The raid on the British Telecom offices shows the real face of Britain's racist Employers, police, immigration laws. and government immigration officials cooperate closely to hunt and persecute immigrants. The spectre of Latchmere remand centre hangs over every black in Britain. The Manpower Services Commission might claim it needs race checks to tight racism in employment. But the checks provide vital information to tighten controls on black workers in Britain.

The fishing raid shows it's vital that workers refuse to cooperate with the authorities. We cannot fight racism by feeding information to the racists. The raid underlines the importance of opposing all immigration laws. They make illegal", every black worker a potential liable to interrogation, arrest and deporttion members had taken strike action in protest. All this with no strike pay or official union support. • What was the response from the MSC?

At Hackney it was a case of headless The local manager sent for the chickens. area manager, who sent for the number two at the MSC. At the MSC national HQ in Sheffield, management put out a statement War to their employees to counter the leaflets. Loveman has also written to the press, defending the race checks He claims the MSC needs the race checks to stamp out job discrimination against black people. If you take a close look at the Youth Training Scheme - run by the MSC — it's racist to the core. A survey of the YTS Birmingham and Solihull proves the point. One in five school leavers there are black, only one in 20 got on to the better schemes where there's most chance ending up with a job. So who does the MSC think it's kidding? All the facts show that they re racist. The MSC knows the real score, and they know there will be opposition. They've told local management to keep the scheme secret from 'any organisation suspected not to be sympathetic towards the idea of ethnic But that category doesn't monitoring include the CPSA leadership.

• What's the CPSA up to? At first CPSA leaders backed the checks After the dole workers began to strike against the checks, there was a fight in the union. Now official policy is to oppose ethnic monitoring of claimants When the MSC told the CPSA about the job centre race checks, the union organised a vote in the offices affected. But by the time the vote was counted - it was 376 to 178 in favour of strike action — a CPSA official had already made a deal with the MSC to sabotage opposition. The vote result was suppressed and members were told that action would not get official support. So job centre staff assumed the vote had opposed strike action. Many workers still need convincing that all race checks have to be opposed.

The union leadership argues that so long as it's voluntary, ethnic monitoring is OK. The left in the union argue that we shouldn't fight for all-out opposition to the checks, in case we lose the vote at conference.

But we'd rather double or treble the core of committed opponents of the checks, than passed wishy-washy motion get conference. If you only oppose the method used to collect information, all the government has to do is change the method and the checks go through. • So what are War's plans now?

We've given the MSC a thick ear this time, but they're not finished. We have to be on the look out for the next attempt to get the checks through, and build all-out opposition We'll be at the CPSA in the union. conference in Brighton on 10 May. Any union member who wants to fight racism should contact us straight away.

ation. By dividing workers into "legals' and establishment divides "illegals', the The labour movement against ourselves. must organise against every deportation and all immigration controls.

ROP

Rupert Murdoch won't give us a printing plant, we derive few benefits from falling oil prices, and we backed a loser in the Grand National. So it's still down to you to come up with the cash we need to make tns a winner We're looking to expand the paper and its circulation, to make sure the working class has the paper it needs to counter the Murdochs and Shahs - and the Kinnocks.

Rush donations to BM RCP, London WCIN 3XX. Cheques payable to RCP Association.

the next step • 11 April 1986 • 3

BRING THE CURTAIN DOWN

Labour movement

LIVERPOOL AND LAMBETH FARCE

COURT JESTERS HATTON AND KNIGHT

W hen the GLC went out in a blaze Liverpool fireworks, and Lambeth councils also chose to put on a theatrical final performance. Liverpool's takes the form of an appeal to the high court. Lambeth's runs in the council chamber for the next few weeks.

Local people will give their verdict on the Labour left's municipal pranks on 8 May.

The decision of the high court to surcharge and disqualify from office for five years 80 councillors from Liverpool and Lambeth, over their delay in setting a rate outrageous attack on last year, an democratic rights. The judges have deprived people of their elected representatives, and made clear that any attempt to resist cuts in local government spending will be penalised in the courts. Revolutionary Communist Party candidates will be running in council elections in Liverpool and Lambeth next month to challenge the record and the policies of the Labour left But instead of going all out to mobilise popular resistance to the Tory cuts, the leftwing Labour councillors have chosen to pursue the same sort of policies that have workers' willingness to fight undermined against the cuts, and have left the councillors vulnerable to victimisation by the Tories.

Meanwhile they are passing the cuts on to local people. In Liverpool the councillors have sworn to take their case to the court of 4m the next step • 11 April 1986 appeal. The transport workers' union, which had offered to finance this appeal, has backed off under pressure from a Labour leadership which would be happy to keep out Liverpool's Militant office. Yet the councillors say they will take their fight for 'natural justice all the way to the house of lords. It is appropriate that the Labour left's campaign against rate-capping should end up with its leading figures traipsing cap-inhand through the courts. Heralded as the left's great cause of 1985, the rate-capping struggle was promoted at mass rallies, days of action and in hundreds of articles in radical journals. Yet the campaign collapsed at the first hint of confrontation with the establishment. A few dozen councillors were left to carry the can for continuing their rhetoric of defiance for a few days longer than their colleagues deemed expedient.

DEMORALISING

The Liverpool councillors held out the longest, but this timetable was dictated by the government, not by Derek Hatton and his colleagues. They are not being penalised for their actions in resisting the cuts - they have imposed austerity policies just like every other council. They have been charged and convicted for making token gestures which conferred no benefits on local people.

The rhetorical character of the Liverpool Labour councillors' campaign against the had the effect of demoralising cuts has resistance to the Tories. Tens of thousands of Liverpool workers took to the streets to demonstrate their opposition to government policies during 1984 and 1985. But that spirit of resistance has been dissipated by a council leadership committed to balancing the books. Instead of going out to rally popular support, the council leadership put its faith in creative accounting and other manoeuvres to postpone the showdown. In June 1985 the council dumped its policy of not setting a rate, increased rates by nine percent and passed a deficit budget. But this only put off the confrontation until November. By then the council's backroom scheming and its manipulation of committees had created such confusion in the city that there was little support for When the conflict with the government.

councillors' appeals for action fell on deaf ears, they accepted a rescue deal from Swiss bankers. The package included a commitment to 'unallocated cuts of t3.8m, a clause to abide by the law, and it stored up massive debts for the city in two years time. This was no last minute retreat — the deal had been worked out by city accountants months in At every stage the council was advance. prepared to push its luck with the Tories to the limit while preparing for capitulation.

BLAME MILITANT

On their last day of action in March, the isolation the Liverpool councillors On a day when became fully apparent. 30 000 Liverpool council workers had been called out, only 400 turned up to a rally.

Where else could the councillors turn but to the courts? The Militant Tendency has often the shown its willingness to resort to capitalist courts during its long-running squabble with the Labour leaders. The main legacy of the Militant Tendency in Liverpool seems likely to be to boost the authority of the courts to interfere in labour movement affairs. The other legacy of the left-wing Labour council will be even worse con- This ditions for local people.

week the council is expected to announce a further package of rent rises, rate rises, redundancies and a freeze on recruitment.

If the Alliance succeed in taking control in Liverpool on 8 May, the Militant councillors will blame the Tories, the Labour leadership, the media and the weather. But the central responsibility for the fiasco of Liverpool council lies with the council's left-wing Labour leadership. The final gesture of Lambeth's Labour group, before the disqualification of 31 of its members took effect, was to install council powers in the hands of a three-person committee composed of Labour councillors disqualified The who have not been Lambeth councillors, able to raise only half the amount required to meet fines and legal costs, have ruled out the option of following But their Liverpool wrough me courts.

alternative depends just as much on manipulating council structures as Liverpool's, and has nothing to offer as a way of fighting the cuts. Although popular resistance to the Tory cuts was never as widespread in London as in Liverpool, there were several large demonstrations last year, with substantial contingents from Lambeth. On Democracy Day in March last year, and again in October, tens of thousands of workers came out to demonstrate their opposition to the Tories. In an area of acute deprivation such as Lambeth, where until recently signing on was a bi-monthly ritual, cuts are already hitting people hard. But in Lambeth, just as in Liverpool, the Labour council's commitment to balancing the books has gradually sapped resistance over the past six years Lambeth first pledged to defy the Tories just after Thatcher came to power in 1979, when the government cut the council's rate support grant. Yet three months later left- Ted wing council leader • Knight was proposing real savings, involving rationalisation, greater efficiency and a reduction in overall staffing levels'. Five months later he recommended a rate increase, while still talking about fighting the cuts. Knight has pursued the same vacillating approach ever

GRAND FINALE

At the Labour local government conference called to coordinate the rate-capping campaign in November 1984, Knight spelt out his position. He argued that the governmenthad 'got to believe we are prepared to go to the brink'. In the event the Tories called the left's bluff, and Knight's attempt to convince the government - and the rest of the Labour Party - that he meant business landed him in court. The left's policy of making gestures, and then pulling back at the brink' to remain within the constraints of legality, left exposed to the courts without providing any effective way of rallying popular opposition to the government. The isolation of the Lambeth councillors has been apparent at their recent rallies. A called last month to build conference support for the surcharged councillors and opposition to the cuts attracted only 100 people. A fund-raising rally featuring Tony Benn and Diane Abbott attracted only a couple of dozen more. The of the surcharged final night councillors started with Knight filibustering, because his colleagues turned up late for the debate. He finally manoeuvred the council to ensure that the Labour group would remain in power for a few weeks more, under the control of a hand-picked junta. The debate degenerated into farce. Portraits of Lloyd Leon outgoing mayor and pub landlord - bobbed across the chamber.

danced together Surcharged councillors while votes were counted. A Dlague wa: unveiled to commemorate the councillors fight, and the evening reached its climax in a singalong to a pre-recorded tape of the Internationale This show was witnessed by 150 Labour Party members from all over London and other parts of the country. Council staff and local people were conspicuous by their absence. The Revolutionary Communist Party is running for the council in Liverpool and Lambeth, to expose the hypocrisy of the Labour Party and to make the point that the only way to save jobs and services is to organise direct action against the Tories.

The past three years in Liverpool and seven years in Lambeth have shown that conterence rhetoric, committee room manoeuvres, deals with the unions and stunts are worse We intend to put our class than useless. struggle policies forward during the campaign, and to carry on fighting for them after we are elected.(See page 11 for campaign details.) If you live in Liverpool or Lambeth and would like to get involved in a council election campaign with a difference, get in touch with Ann Burton on 01-729 0414. Vote RCP on 8 May: class struggle is the only promise our candidates make.

John Pearson

part 3 The Border War argaret Boyle has been dragged from her home, sexually abused, beaten until she vomited blood and would be warned her children killed unless she did what her captors Yet her ordeal prompted no wanted. hysterical headlines in the gutter press, no violent documentaries about TV

OUT

society, and no calls in parliament for tougher police action. But then Margaret Boyle is not an English vicar's daughter from Ealing. She is an Irish republican from Strabane, County Tyrone.

And her attackers weren't hooded hooligans with strange tattoos on their arms. They were

JOE BOATMAN

men in uniform with Royal Ulster Constabulary' emblazoned across their caps. Tougher police action is the last thing she needs.

These days people in high places pretend that the RUC is an even-handed police force, confronting both republican and Loyalist opponents of the Anglo-Irish agreement.

But away from the cameras, people in places like Strabane on the Border know the closest the police get to being 'even-handed is using both fists to beat up supporters of Irish freedom. Behind all the ballyhoo about Loyalists fighting police, republicans are the real victims of the Anglo-Irish deal. Mick Hume reports from Strabane Margaret Boyle's ordeal in RUC custody happened after the Anglo-Irish deal was done.

But it seems nobody had told the RUC they were now a reformed, impartial force.

In Northern Ireland, it's the worms who get up early. The RUC were at Margaret Boyle's home at half past six in the morning to drag her away from her crying children.

*My oldest boy was clinging to me, they had to tear him off. That nearly destroyed me.

Then my youngest said, "Can I come too, mummy?" and this policewoman said, "No young yet, son." you're too policewoman was wrong. As her superiors reminded Margaret Boyle at Castlereagh interrogation centre, an Irish nationalist is never too young to suffer. "They threatened my eldest son's life if I didn't talk to them.

They said, "In another year or two you mark my words, young Terry will be walking down the road one night and a Saracen or something might run over him, or he might meet with a plastic bullet — very accidentally."

"They were serious, they do kill children.

He's 1i in July - they've killed younger than that, haven't they? Then they got my boy at the shops, and said, "You wee bastard, we re gonna get you!" How can a man talk to a child like that?' Margaret Boyle was sick when the RUC raided her, and they dragged her off roughly enough to ensure she was soon throwing up blood: 'I was ill three or four times on the way up to Castlereagh, the police had to stop, all these armed men standing around guarding me while I was vomiting at the side of the road.' But when she got to the RUC torture centre, She police interrogators were discovered the much sicker than she could ever be.

*I didn't speak to them when I was in. All I said was, "I have to go" when I was going to be sick. And the policeman says,

THE BRITISH

SICKNESS

MARGARET BOYLE'S HUSBAND PAINTS IN PRISON AT THE 'SECRETARY OF STATE'S PLEASURE' you bitch, and if you're sick I'll make sure you lick it up." But he had to let me go, for I would have thrown up on him "You're in a cell and there's two of them at you, a man and a woman, one sitting right up at your face. They're kicking you and shoving you all the time. And they really get into degrading you because you're a woman, everybody in Strabane. Then she would go out, and he'd say, "I'm coming down to your cell and give you something tonight." You go back to your cell and you're thinking he's probably only pulling a bluff, but Jesus if he did come what would you do like? But the tning lat policewomen. The stuff they come out with is worse than the men, it degraded them, not Another favourite trick the RUC uses to get at its victims is to go on about deadad •My brother had a tragic death, he was stabbed, and they came out with some disgusting things about his body and all. They're always doing that kind of thing.

When the three boys were shot up the hill there, they showed photos of one of them to his brother, with the back of his brains hanging out all over the field. A girl I know was really close to one of the boys, and the RUC stopped a jeep down the town and called her over and showed her a picture of him all riddled to death and all, and them all stood there laughing and everything' "The three boys' were young IRA volunteers, blown apart by an SAS heavy machine gun and then shot through the head as they lay wounded, in a sloping field near Margaret Boyle's home in February 1985.

WELC

LO Ol march, pulling flags off graves and provoking riots- part of its everyday business of beating up nationalists in Border towns.

suffering of young Irishmen whose backs are up and they join the IRA to express that they don't want these people in their country doing what they're doing'. Her husband, Terry, has spent the last eight years in jail for shooting a British soldier. The day before we met her he had been out on a 24 hour parole for his mother's funeral. Nobody knows when he will see Strabane again, because he hasn't got a set sentence to serve. He is the victim of a legal system designed to dress up a war as a problem of law and order.

Terry Boyle was 21 when he was arrested.

But the attacks he was charged with dated back five years. Because he was convicted of a murder committed before he was 18, he was sentenced to Secretary of State's Pleasure'. He is in prison until the government decides he can come out. And 'pleasure' is the right word for the British state's reaction to having republicans There are more than 50 'SOSPs' in jail in Ireland. One of the reforms hinted at before the Anglo-Irish deal was done was that they would be given release dates. But there has been little change. Instead the British are

ECLULH

Terry had a review, where the governor decides whether you should be considered for release. My husband said to him, "Look, I'm a republican, you're a Loyalist, the people on the review board are Loyalists, so what chance have I got?" They asked him why he was on the republican wing, why he didn't move into the mixed prisoners' wing, implying that he'd have a better chance.

Terry told them he doesn't like mixing with rapists and housebreakers because he's not a "Then they said, "Now suppose I propose you be released, what would you do if a guy slithers up to you in the pub and says he's a wee job for you?" They just want to know if you're a republican, whether they release "innocence" or anything. But my husband is a republican, he's a prisoner of conscience, and he's not going to pretend he's something he's

ANOTHER COUNTRY

Over the 17 years of the war in Ireland, Strabane has bred its share of men and women who were not prepared to pretend.

"There'd be a lot of support for the IRA in Strabane,' says Margaret Boyle. "The Provisionals are an honest reaction to the troubles in our country and the British presence, and the people's demand for them to go. It's very basic, it's very honest, and it's Outside the Boyles' home on an estate decorated with "IRA land' graffiti, we could see the hillside cemetery from where the SAS shot those three young IRA men, and where they lie buried. And the next generation of keeping one eye on the ball and the other on the road from where the Army, the police and their plastic bullets might come.

Strabane was the last stop on our Border tour, and we raced through the night to catch the plane back to Britain. As the plane banked over the lights of London, a bunch of trendy Belfast Loyalists in Italian t-shirts gawped out of the window. 'Jesus,' says one, 'it's like another country, isn't it?' Yes, it is

THE

PROPAGANDA

WAR

A LABOUR PAPER?

Ever since the collapse of the Daily Herald in 1964, the labour movement has lacked a newspaper of its own. Rupert Murdoch's cyncial offer to give the old Times plant to the unions has reopened discussion about a labour movement newspaper.

Back in 1983 the question was the subject of a major TUC inquiry, chaired by industrial relations academic Lord McCarthy. The TUC decided that the £6.7m it would require just to launch such a paper was more than the unions could afford, and the project was shelved. In fact it was not shortage of funds that deterred the union leaders. As Murdoch well knew when he challenged them to take over his presses and meet him in the marketplace, their reluctance to launch a paper reflects The old Daily Herald began as a strike sheet produced by print workers during a lockout in 1911. Under the editorship of George Lansbury, it soon became the paper of the rising labour movement in the period Lansbury was a militant left-wing socialist who opposed the First World War, supported the Russian Revolution and the movement for independence in Ireland, as well as demands for women's emancipation and trade union rights. As leader of the Poplar councillors revolt against the 1919 equivalent of rate-capping, he served time in Brixton prison. The Daily Herald reflected the campaigning approach of its The Daily Herald reached the peak of its influence during the working class upsurge that followed the First World War. Its circulation varied between 250 000 and 500000 in 1919 and 1920. In those years leadership of the labour movement. Indeed the Labour Party launched its own paper the Daily Citizen - in an unsuccessful attempt to meet the left-wing challenge The Daily Herald reflected the mood of rank and file revolt not only against bureaucratic leadership of the unions and Labour Party. The Daily Herald first labelled as 'Black Friday' the day on which the leaders of the rail and transport unions Yet the Daily Herald reflected the left's weaknesses as well as its strengths. Its opposition to war and colonial repression was pacifist rather than anti-imperialist. Its support for workers' struggles accepted the limitations of the existing system, rather than trying to direct these struggles against the system itself. As the defeats of the early twenties strengthened the grip of the labour bureaucracy over the movement, the Daily Herald too succumbed. In 1925 Lansbury publishing giant Odhams. The Daily Herald retained its popularity in the inter-war period, but this was no longer based on its radical and campaigning journalism. It thrived on the more familiar Fleet Street mix of sentimentality and sensationalism. In the post-war period it languished until it was finally taken over by Murdoch to suffer the ultimate ignominy relaunch in September 1964 as the Sun In the stormy years around the First World War, the labour movement could sustain its own newspaper because it had something to say. The best that Norman Willis and Neil Kinnock could manage would be some sort of cross between the Morning Star and Today. No wonder Murdoch is ready to risk the competition.

the next step • 11 April 1986 • 5

LOYALTO THE CROW

Why are Ulster Loyalists shooting at the policemen they have sworn to support?

Mick Hume assesses the battle over the Anglo-Irish agreement There are few more confusing sights than television pictures of an Ulster Loyalist using a Union Jack to batter a member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary over the head. As the RUC comes under fire from its 'own people' in the Protestant community, many in Britain must have echoed the thoughts of Tory backbencher Michael Latham: 'What kind of Loyalist puts on a hood and stands at a barricade?' The people who pose as the bedrock of British law and order are now lobbing rocks at the Queen's police. This has been seized on by as confirmation that scotcatalors Northern Ireland is an irrational place which people in Britain can never understand. Media reports stress the mystical character of the "tribal marching season. But the current conflict has nothing to do with Irish tribalism.

It is about British imperialism, and its relations with the two communities in Northern Ireland.

Let's look at the Loyalists first. Why are they Anglo-Irish suddenly up in arms over the agreement? The Unionist campaign against the accord has progressed through council boycotts and parliamentary by-elections, to illegal marches,

RUC

Meanwhile, riots and shooting Loyalists and Tories have pursued a political pantomime. The deal is a stepping stone to a united Ireland, say the Unionists. Oh no it isn't, says Northern Ireland secretary Tom King, it's *a massive great wall against it'. Oh yes it is, say the Unionists. And so on.

By affirming the In fact King is right. permanence of Partition, the accord with Dublin underlines the Union rather than undermines it.

But it would be wrong to conclude that the Loyalists are simply too stupid or stubborn to recognise the truth. Their protests are the latest manifestation of a real historical fear that any might displace them from their change privileged position within Ulster.

PANIC BUTTON

Since Britain created Northern Ireland in 1921, Protestants have been guaranteed privileged access to jobs, houses and power over their Catholic neighbours. The British government's own reports confirm that sectarian discrimination continues today. Catholics are as likely to be unemployed as

LATECHES

Protestants. Most recent statistics show only 16 Catholics among 116 officers on the government's own employment training schemes. It's the same story across the job market.

The Loyalists rely on the link with Britain to perpetuate their advantaged status. This means Westminster: has always been able to rely on them as dogged defenders of British rule in Ireland. But it has also made Northern Unionists sensitive to any move that threatens to shift the status quo, however slightly.

The lifeline that keeps the Loyalists strapped to their British paymasters is a slender and The Union between Great Britain shaky one. and Northern Ireland is entirely artificial. There is no natural or national justification for it. It can only be maintained through an extraordinary system of state controls - repressive laws that are the envy of South African statesmen and the presence of 30 000 troops and paramilitary police. The artificial Union is inherently unstable.

Anything that alters the established power relations in Ulster - like the Anglo-Irish added pressure on the agreement puts Unionists Protestant ascendancy, and has pressing the panic button.

The Unionists object to the accord because it shifts authority away from Belfast, on to a London-Dublin The Loyalists have axIs always tried to avoid pressure for reform by 1986 a the neyt ctens 11 enril keeping political power in the province in their own pockets. They achieved this for 50 years, ruling Northern Ireland as they liked from their private parliament at Stormont, and subjecting Catholics to brutal treatment.

Loyalists have also tried to isolate their state from outside pressures by excluding Northern Ireland from the process of political debate in Britain. As the Unionists' hero Lord Carson put it before Partition, *Ulster wants above all things to be removed from the area of party wish has been fulfilled, with the cooperation of all British parties, Unionists have confirmed their splendid isolation by treating the Southern Irish state as a hostile and alien power which, as Ian Paisley always says, 'gave birth to the IRA and still terrorist murderers. In lact the modern IRA was created by the persecution of Catholics in the Northern state, and its activists are almost all Northerners. But blaming the cutting Ulster off from the world and on its sectarian traditions.

This maintaining explains the Protestant preoccupation with the past that has the media mocking them for being "locked in a time machine'

TONING IT DOWN

Westminster now wants to alter the established set-up in the Six Counties.

But that doesn't mean Britain is a modernising force for progress in Ireland. Doctor Paisley may have as authorities created Loyalism and have encourvital prop of their power.

The conflict over the Anglo-Irish accord only indicates that the British take a more long-term view of oppression in Ireland than the narrowminded bigots of Ulster. British governments share the Unionists concern with crushing the republican struggle for Irish freedom, and keeping Irish nationalists under the heel. But Westminster has wider concerns. It has to convince people in Britain that Northern Ireland is a fairly normal place. It has to keep international opinion on its side.

And, increasingly, it has to stop the instability in the North from spilling over into the Southern Republic. Since the present stage of the Irish War erupted in 1969, British governments have launched political initiatives to put a democratic veneer on their colonial regime in Ireland.

And they have tried to tone down the more embarrassing excesses of Protestant privilege.

None of these changes challenged the basis of British power or the Loyalists' position of economic advantage. But they have panicked altering Protestant leaders by political arrangements in the North, and prompted some Loyalists to take on the authorities in an tide. Relations attempt turn back the between the British and Unionist establishments have deteriorated over 17 years of the Irish War. Loyalist protests against British 'reforms' have often been more violent than today. When the British government tried to nip the troubles in the bud by abolishing the Protestant in 1969, paramilitary Specials Belfast Loyalist rioters killed the first RUC man to die in the war. In 1972 Britain abolished the Protestant parliament at Stormont and introduced Direct Rule from Westminster. Loyalists strike, demonstrated and built went barricades, while the Unionist Party broke off formal links with the Conservatives. In 1974 Loyalist shop stewards and paramilitaries backed by the British Army - organised a successful and violent general strike agaınst a British government plan for power-sharing. In 1977 they tried to repeat the exercise. Without the backing of the British security forces they failed, but not before they had claimed a few lives. The campaign against the Anglo-Irish agreement now threatens to match the "best' and bloodiest tradition of Loyalist 'democratic protests. The question now being asked - 'How can Loyalists be loyal if they fight the the government?' — misses the point. The Loyalists are loyal to the British state machine which perpetuates their position in Northern Ireland.

For them, the state is symbolised by the sovereign. But this loyalty to the British state does not mean they always kowtow to the commands of whichever British party happens to hold a majority in the house of commons. If ROYAL ULSTER CONSTABULARY MEN IN RIOT GEAR FACE LOYALIST MOBS WAVING UNION JACKS IN the Loyalists decide that the government is going against the interests of the Union, they will oppose it. Unionist newspaper adverts have warned RUC members that the Anglo-Irish the role of the RUC deal radically alters officers, who are employed and who took ar oath to "truly serve" our sovereign' — and not the message implies, to serve Thatcher.

LONG, HOT SUMMER

The Loyalists' dependence on the link with Britain means there are limits to how far their protests can go. The Protestant community is not capable of sustaining an armed uprising against the state that sponsors it. But a militan minority of Loyalists are more than capable of keeping up the current violent campaign throughout this summer's marching season And, as with every Loyalist protest, they wil

\, NOT TO THATCHER

RTADOWN

save their worst excesses for the Catholics they identify as the worst enemies of the Union.

Catholics in vicious little Loyalist towns like Portadown are in for a long, hot summer.

Loyalists also have a bloody tradition of dealing with "traitors' in their own ranks.

Unionist politicians who get too involved in British initiatives have quickly been ditched. And rank and file Loyalist activists who show signs of 'going soft' often end up face down in a ditch. The current attacks on RUC men are a new phase of this old practice.

Yet the contradiction of fighting the forces of the Crown under the Union Jack is already beginning to work itself out, fragmenting the Unionist alliance against the accord. Paisley's Democratic Unionist Party has to respond to its more militant supporters, while restrain them within reasonable limits.

appearance on the illegal Portadown parade last week was an attempt to re-establish his authority among radical Loyalists, defuse the situation. The fact that he failed to do underlines Paisley's problem. Meanwhile Paisley's partner, Official Unionist Party chief James Molyneaux, is closely keeping very quiet, aware that the violence upsets his more middle class and moderate supporters, yet afraid to condemn it outright and split the Loyalist camp.

Frustration at Britain's refusal to dump the Anglo-Irish hardliners on to the street. concentrated the minds of more level headed Loyalist leaders. They now talk openly of the need to reach Westminster. As Official Unionist secretary Frank Millar put it this week, 'Failure trying to His to make an honourable peace with London would drive us inevitably alternative. have to submit to the treatment.

Thatcher and King Paisley and pressurise about a form of devolved the Protestant position by Stormont assembly. accord to requests to 'suspend' it.

before ally problem in Ireland.

THE REAL THREAT

seriously -eve from republican the resistance. report noted, claiming to nationalists in for the republican movement, of the Northern nationalists. They progress. opinion. nationalist and to enjoyed some success. credibility has been an current announced its deal may have sent Loyalist But it has with accommodation general focus radical -to Republic' Millar is making clear that, in the end, the only alternative to accepting the accord is to break the Union -which means there is no The Loyalists can kick and bite, but when the British establishment insists, they will ultimately are now trying to Co into negotiations government, lo include the moderate nationalist Social Democratic and Labour Party. This could safeguard returning most functions of the Anglo-Irish bodies Unionist leaders have responded by changing their calls to smash' the But there is sufficient pressure from below to ensure that Loyalist politicians cannot give in to the government yet. The marching season will latch on give Northern Ireland an unstable few months final bargain is struck. From Britain's point of view, the most important the aspect of the conflict with the Loyalists is its impact on the nationalist community. The nationalists are always the Crown's biggest Arguments between the Unionists of Belfast and the Tory or Labour unionists of London are about the specific form British rule should take in Northern Ireland. Crown control itself is questioned. the war

SITE

between the nationalists and the British state raises the all-important issue of who should have sovereignty on Irish soil. Despite all their "impartial peacekeepers' posturing, the British authorities admit that the real threat to their power - what they call 'terrorism' - comes struggle for national liberation in Ireland. And the real purpose of the security forces is to crush nationalist As a recent confidential commons committee Except for brief periods, the predominant threat has come from terrorists represent the nationalist community... This has inevitably meant that the operations of all the security forces...have had a August 1985) greater impact on the normal life of the minority community. The 'impact' the repressive activities of the security forces have had on recent years is to harden has opposition to the British presence and support which has enjoyed a string of electoral successes. The aim Anglo-Irish agreement has been to reverse this process, by offering the prospect of reforms in Northern Ireland and recognising the Southern government's role in representing Britain can offer no real reforms to the nationalists it oppresses. So the Tories have tried a cynical bluff to create the illusion of deliberately excluded the Unionists from their year-long negotiations with Dublin, knowing full well that this would provoke a Protestant backlash. They calculated Meanwhile, that getting the Paisleys of Ulster to scream 'sell-out' when the deal was done represented their best chance of selling it to a section of The Tory scheme has Since the Anglo-Irish deal was signed, there increase in harassment of Party republicans (see page 5). And no reforms have been forthcoming. The British government has intention to continue with supergrass trials and the strip searching of holmes women republican prisoners, refused to commit itself to repealing the Flags and Emblems Act (which makes flying the Irish tricolour illegal) and has even re-introduced its shoot-to-kill squads, which shot dead two nationalists in February after a 12-month respite. Pathetic "reforms', like sectarian RUC men accompanying the sectarian Ulster Defence Regiment, are still 'under discussion'. And while the cameras clashes between the police and support the Loyalist marchers, the RUC ran riot through forces last week's republican parade in Derry.

bootboys. terror would boost support for the republican movement. But repression is now taking place in circumstances which mitigate against a traditional anti-British response. Loyalist opposition to the accord and the clashes between the RUC and Orangemen mean many nationalists are unconvinced about the agreement's anti-republican character. Nationalists save their most bitter hatred for bigots like Paisley, and there is a. feeling that anything which upsets them can't be all bad.

The republican movement has had a problem cohering its support since the deal was signed.

The SDLP's defence of the police during clashes with Loyalists has not damaged the moderate party's support among nationalists in the way that backing the RUC would once have done.

It is inevitable that, in a drawn-out war of attrition, some people on the receiving end will initiative that promises all movement towards peace. The Tories have been able to use the Anglo-Irish agreement to play on cumulative build-up of 'war-weariness' within sections of the nationalist community.

Against this background, the impact of the accord has exposed the limits of the electoral strategy which brought Sinn Fein to prominence. The republican base of support in the nationalist ghettos relies on the IRA's armed struggle against the British forces of occupation.

As leading republicans have often made clear, the IRA is a vital defence force for the besieged nationalists and there can be no question of giving up the use of arms. Yet more moderate nationalists are loath to lend their support to Sinn Fein because of the IRA's actions.

This tension means that, as Gerry Adams, Sinn Fein president and MP, says, the party's successes have been based more on activating existing support than attracting new layers to the republican cause: 'Firstly it is that if Sinn Fein's performance and development in the North in recent years have received dramatic news coverage, this performance and these developments were possible because a fairly clear republican base already existed. What we have been doing in recent years has been to structure

A DANGEROUS GAME

The initial reaction to the Anglo-Irish deal made difficult the republican

HOTE

movement's battle to broaden its base. This does not mean republicanism is in decline.

Britain still cannot beat the IRA. So long as there are British troops in Ireland, there will be support for an armed struggle against them.

And another British Army or RUC atrocity can always revitalise support for Sinn Fein. But in the short term at least, manipulating the Loyalist reaction to the accord has given Britain a useful propaganda victory within the nationalist community. The Tories are playing a very dangerous game.

The Loyalist backlash they have provoked will keep Northern Ireland on the boil this summer.

the IRA continues its strikingly successful campaign of attacking British forces and fortresses across the Six Counties.

The British authorities are under considerable pressure in Ireland. The guarantee that they can get away with their scheme is the lack of opposition within Britain. Kinnock's Labour has proved slavish supporter Thatcher's deal with Dublin, only complaining that the two governments have been inefficient in persecuting republicans like Evelyn Glen- Our job in Britain is to demystify the conflicts between the Loyalists and the RUC, to explain the real issues in Ireland to people in Britain.

We have to drum home one message time and again: the British state is the force for all violence in Ireland, and the Irish people are the only ones with the right to determine their future. There has rarely been a more important time to build the Irish Freedom Movement, to liberation struggle against the of the their Crown • Loyalls! tha novt et

nternational

OIL PRICE WAR

In the seventies the rise in oil prices was blamed for the onset of the recession - today the oil price crash is greeted as the harbinger of recovery. Helen Simons looks at the world of JR Ewing and Sheikh Yamani il prices have been plummeting for four months. In December a barrel of oil cost $30 - now it fetches around $10. Oil prices are lower than they were before the 1973 Arab-Israeli war triggered the major price increase at the start of the first wave of the world recession.

The fluctuation in oil prices is a symptom, not a cause, of movements in the world The for prices to economy. tendency oscillate wildly reflects the uneven impact of the recession on different oil-producing and oil-consuming countries. The consequences Western are ikev to be less rosv than economists and politicians would like to believe. Instability in the oil markets will 8 • the next step • 11 April 1986

SOUTHFORK FOR SALE?

lead to more Western economic and political interference in the Middle East and other oil- The oil price war could producile areas. even become a shooting war in some of the world's most strategically sensitive regions.

The immediate cause of the oil price collapse is the failure of the ministers of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries - Opec - to agree on production ceilings at their recent meeting in Geneva.

For the past three years Opec tried to persuade its member countries to accept voluntary limits on output as a way of But this policy, always bolstering prices. difficult to enforce, has brought diminishing results. Steadily declining oil prices have made producers more reluctant to curtail Opec has been forced to abandon output. the policy. In the seventies Opec was able to dictate oil prices to the world. At that time the dramatic rise in oil prices, after the Arab defeat in the 1973 Yom Kippur war, was seen in the West as revenge extracted by the Arab Western media rulers. The constructed of the oil sheikhs, racist caricatures condemning them for taking advantage of their monopoly to plunge their old masters into ruin. In reality Western countries had long taken advantage of their influence in the Middle East to buy oil way below its market value. The panic over oil prices arose because suppliers joined forces to compel the West to buy its oil at market prices.

For Western capitalists, the oil price rise cola not Have come al a worse une.

Pressures of declining profitability and hot meant they needed to cut competition production costs in industry. The drive to cheapen the costs of raw material and energy inputs became a major preoccupation. The result of the oil price rise was that the underlying crisis of profitability was interpreted as an energy crisis. For the Western media, the problem was not the basic laws of capitalist economy, but "greedy oil sheikhs'. The oil price rises of the seventies caused changes in the oil world, which have led to today's crash in prices. High oil prices encouraged non-Opec countries like Britain and Norway to develop oil wells. Given the high costs of extracting oil from the North Sea bed, this enterprise only became viable after the price rises. Since 1979 Opec's share of the world oil market has dropped from more than half to less than one third.

THE SQUEEZE

Since the seventies oil consumption has fallen sharply. The sluggish performance of the world economy as a whole since the turn of the eighties, and the collapse of much manufacturing industry, has reduced the demand for oil. of development alternative sources of energy - notably nuclear power - has also contributed to the decline. Oil consumption has fallen by 10 When million barrels a day since 1979.

output rises and demand falls, the result is a Given the refusal of non-Opec glut. countries to cooperate with its attempts to restrict output, the only effect of this policy was to squeeze Opec producers into a smaller share of the market. The current crisis began when the big Gulf oil producers decided the time had come to reverse their policy of restraint. In Saudi Arabia and Kuwait export revenues were hit hard by the falling demand for oil, creating a growing gap between the oil states' incomes and their lavish expenditures on imported plant, machinery and consumer goods.

By switching to flat-out production, the Gulf states set out to flood the market and provoke a price collapse that would destroy their rivals. Their enormous oil reserves and cheap production costs make this a viable Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are

SILELCEY.

prepared to sacmisce some short-term revenue to knock out their competitors and allow them to regain their dominant

THE CASUALTIES

• American oil producers Oilmen from Texas, Alaska, Oklahoma and Louisiana have lobbied the White House for measures to stem the flow of cheap foreign oil into the USA. Thousands of small rigs have closed over the past five years, and now even big companies like the Ewings of Southfork are being forced to cut back. The oil crisis precipitated 120 bank failures in the US oil belt last year and unemployment is rising fast. • North Sea oil In Norway falling oil revenues have forced the government its first Enoduce austerity budget. In Britain Britoil has announced a 40 per cent cut in exploration plans for next year. The entrance to Aberdeen harbour is clogged by redundant rigs.

• Nigeria, Venezuela, Indonesia, Mexico These third world countries rely on oil revenues to repay their heavy debts to Western bankers. All have already been forced to take measures to reschedule their debt repayment. Declining oil income forces governments to implement drastic austerity leading to political programmes, more instability. position in the world oil market. In the meantime they hope cheaper oil will stimulate demand, returning oil usage to the heights of the seventies.

The oil price collapse resulting from the actions of the Gulf states has its victims (see box), but it also has its beneficiaries. The top financial fixers of the capitalist world in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund are determined to look on the bright side of the oil price collapse. They have already revised upwards their estimates for world growth over the next few years. They hope that cheaper fuel costs will encourage ailing manufacturing industry. The more dynamic Western economies of Japan, Germany, Italy and France are counting on the benefits of cheaper energy supplies. Even British chancellor Nigel Lawson hopes that British manufacturing might benefit from cheaper oil. Despite the plight of the US oil industry, Reagan has turned a deaf ear to demands for restricting imports. The USA is a net oil importer with more to gain than to lose from lower fuel costs. Given its poor growth rate in recent months, the US economy needs every possible stimulus. A few oil bankruptcies and bank failures in Houston and Dallas are a small price to pay for a revitalised economy. Reagan also has political reasons for welcoming the oil price crash. The decline in oil prices is likely to hit his enemies — Libya.

the Soviet Union - harder than it hits the USA. It will also make it easier for the USA to exert control through the debt system over countries in Central and South America Reagan hopes to use such influence to aid his foreign policy within the region.

OIL AND GUNS

Reagan's pleasure, however, could be shortlived, as the Gulf states' gamble begins to pay off. Within a few years the world could be even more dependent on Middle Eastern oil as non-Gulf production is knocked out.

For now, reduced oil revenues in the Middle East increase the potential for instability there. The intervention of the US sixth fleet in Lebanon and Libya in recent months, and the presence of the rapid deployment force in bases around the Gulf, suggests the likely pattern of US policy in the Middle East.

The steady decline of British manufacturing through the ups and downs of oil prices over the last two decades confirms that oil has only a marginal influence on the economy. The crisis of profitability - not the price of oil - lies at the root of the capitalist world's economic problems. It will take a lot more than cheap oil to revive British industry. Today's oil wars reveal the underlying tendencies towards international struggle for conflict, rival powers as survival. • Libya, Iran and Iraq Reagan may rejoice that the oil crisis has reduced Colonel Gadaffi's income by 80 per cent. He may take less pleasure from the fact that it is likely to strengthen Iran in its wat against Iraq, which is even more dependent on oil. • Egypt and the Gulf Egypt, the USA's staunchest ally in the Arab world, has already been hard hit by the oil making its problems of internal crisis, instability even worse. Even in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia the costs will be high. Both states have considerable reserves and foreign assets but, if prices fail to rally fairly soon, they will have to impose further cuts with unpredictable political consequences.

• The Soviet Union The Soviet Union relies on oil for more than 60 per cent of its export earnings. The price collapse will deny the Soviet Union the hard currency to import the technology that Gorbachev desperately needs, if he is to achieve his objective of modernising the Soviet economy.

JunIus publications Preparing for Power, the programme of the Revolutionary Communist Party In the opening days of the RCP's campaign in this year's local council elections (see page 11) there has been a sudden increase in demand for the party programme. Originally published in the run-up to the 1983 general election, the programme has since been reprinted twice.

Preparing for Power summary of the RCP's assessment of the current state of the capitalist world and the forces of the establishment and the official labour movement. It outlines our perspective for building a movement in Britain that can advance from defending living standards and rights today towards taking power and building a new form of society.

Preparing for Power answers those who defend the existing system as the best attainable, and the cynics who say it cannot be changed. It issues a challenge to all those who are disgusted with the existing state of the world - join our movement to change it! 30p plus 20p p&p Also avallable from Junlus Moral panics and Victorlan values, Kate Marshall's pamphlet why the debate about censoring page three nudes can only set back the cause of women's liberation. *1.50 plus 40p p&p Taking Control, Mike Freeman's handbook for trade unionists, shows that bosses Murdoch and Maxwell can be tackled, but not by methods Dubbins and Dean. *2.95 plus 85p p&p The Irish War, the Irish Freedom Movement handbook, provides all the background on the Ulster Loyalists and outlines the different reasons why we also oppose the Anglo-Irish agreement. *2.95 plus 85p p&p The Roots of Racism, the Workers Against Racism handbook, exposes the origins and the realities of racism in Britain and puts forward practical ways of fighting it. *1.95 plus 40p p&p All publications avallable from Junlus Publications, BCM JPLTD, London WC1N 3XX. Cheques payable to Junlus Publications Ltd. Five or more coples post free. Blow Monkeys, and the Communards filing into the Odeon when Dumouous into his first story-song. A ule vower in d union

MA/N

these' when another uD ane al sone wazre soul-jazz. Weller's stopped band) as his model. Radio 2 Absolute Beginners, Jullen Temple (director) Colin Macinnes published is a concise in tne preceding year, it ane neesem•ence mneir fact of their being. It is a celeo ator or London too and Notting Hill which could whatever their age, race or are threatening to tear this boom world apart. on oce ue choie has an obvious move. The novel ns own voumtur eves, enes numbers. And how better to explains commodities. eyeful, the as the kids themselves. The like MUSiC om avans.beve if rarely outstanding, is like those of responsible response of gay noting that gay groups have pioneered fund-raising, early seventies which he glorified in earlier, more Red Wedge at Hammersmith Odeon, featuring Billy Bragg, Style Councll, Lorna G, Junior Giscombe. Tom Robinson. the staree wew - 'Sweet murder Red Wedge run a tight show Four thousand fans were still William' ollly braee. to tnose in tne know, launcned solitary minstrel in everyday thick-lipped, ciouies us oceause i uleos ike ns eoest mean ma communist), he aimed his guitar at our heart-strings and sang of - dll amounts to nothing if together we don't stand', and 'days like 'wearing badges is Ol ene esee s pest oaiaes Bertolt Brecht. Io ume to cela coke. une voca Intens ly - Style Council are on stage. Their 15-minute slot consists entirely of new material. Songs like Mix.

playgrounds for Council-leader Paul Weller's new sixties toy: SUleS, soune ne Motown ane sarted Davine srax usine booker Bar-Keys (Otis Redding's backing He's changed his ianglv Rickenbacker guitar for a big semi-acoustic just right for jazzy minor-seventh chords. But just when vou think process. you've heard it all before - on • he adds his own brand of Anglo-pop wistfulness.

That's nothing new either, but Absolute Beginners in 1959. Set celebrates the sub-culture of teenagers, their brassy energy fashions, their sounds, the very especially of a mythical Soho hospitably accommodate all of Macinnes ravourite outsiders sexual orientation. Finally, it is aboul te racial tensions willct Taking all this pretty faithfully made a musical - in many ways makes much of jazz, and the book's form. which consists of the restless wanderings of a central character seen through itself to a succession of musical aute celal Caurll Dy uc acute eye ana ear or tne autno!

the clothes and hairstyles of the times and the abundance of on yes. ule yesud. The cago a ane the holeex!

The film is a spectacular wrap around screen bulging with enerev and incident, ana tne camera always on tne as neurotic and whimsical Bowie, Sade, Style Council et al, competent and varied. They do Dennis Altman, Aids and the New Puritanism, Pluto Press £4.95 Oppression. Dennis alman takes onee in me organisations to the Aids scare, counselling and other services for Aids victims. Altman's book is part of a growing trend among Tore verales lcu women si loeration to aoaot to the pressures of today's rightwing moral backlash. Altman welcomes the turn away trom the aromiseuous excesses ome

REVUEWS

RED WEDGE

The broad church choir the combination of styles is intriguing - if uninspiring.

With their musical ingredients the Blow Monkeys produce a - less developed and more exciting than Weller.

CoToIes averape wale bane tunk witr reggae-seaside organ. Then they switch to a vaudeville sound topped with a thick laver of Shirley Bassey-style vocals. Their a prarine ds malaly the red mutton-chopped, wow.e-nate bass waesal ettective stage-tol to the Norman Bates psycho-presence of their lead singer. Simny somevie sne voice carries the show to its emotional peak. The doo-wop techniques ot the othe communaras (including part timer Junior Giscombe) provide a good backdrop to Somerville's -marred only by the dead sound of the pre recorded backing-tape. The appeal of the Red Wedge variety-pack lies in the musicality of its performers. But their political-patter, unlike their Sulolurlo lauicl tiar escaoes wies acoenine According to Billy Bragg changing the Labour possible 'because it's personal", ane to beat uneme ovment alll you have to do is register to vote and take part in the democratic .ror immy comervie it's OK if socialism means different things to different .CVEn OUP Laous

FIFTIES ON FILM

leen dreams nol ury to ve slavisny benoa, dr approach made easier for them ov tne current dee revival Julien Temple may know all about sub-culture and the meaning of style, but he can't prevent the pressures of the dominant culture from shaping his own product. However handy tookee. me musica. even al Gays for 'safe sex'

AIDS

optimistic works, like Homosexual Liberation and ins pace ne endorses ine new caring attitude to sexual relations, epitomised by the gay movement's guidelines on 'safe sex. His polemic is reserved for homosexuals who persist in their oreterence to wnaae now regarded as dangerous sexual 'Safe sex' implies monogamy or masuiroation. accoreine tome new prescriptions, to avoid Aids gays must avoid sex. Radicals wro once usioocu murdl ohiectons to me nee ane eos lifestyle, now provide medical

PAUL WELLER'S PARTY PROMISES JAM TOMORROW

always meant keeping gays in te coseL nee weuce ay nave rejected tne idealism or tne past, but their idealised vision of social change is equally unreal.

yyith sounu oroored recoraing studios these ideas might be harmless. But the main function of Red Wedge is to recrunt tor the Labour party Diane Abbott, Bernie Grant, Jeremy Corbyn, Ken Livingstone cne wee aane theatre foyer afterwards, to the service of the streets (anc wesl olue olory Came OuL H ass now a ramer secate vehicle, particularly in contrast with the zippy pop video.

Hus ay Dc wiw c ves us c relentless succession of pop videos instead of a more thoughtfully paced musical. The effect might also have been justifications for the abolition of most homosexual activity The book also illustrates a new twist to me tensions mhat nave always existed between gay radicals and those who profit wom te commercial gay scene In the forties and fifties radicals rejected the gay capitalists corve tona eenovout cae refusal to challenge the Today it is the radicals who lead the way in moderauing gay benaviour leaving the bar owners to dismiss the Aids scare because it is bad for business. John Johnson

DAVE ROURKE

encourage youth to sign their own autographs on Labour Party cards. . The politicians vuncular pose went down well with the predominantly middle class auelence ul some wert more sceptical. "It's superficial", said one, "and it could backfire on Lasour ror memue muse strength of Red Wedge could not the fact that Labour's JUvaIL Is to ue ootei, HOEtC youth. Jimmy Simpson cictatee hv the need te incorporate the stars with box office appeal. Without Bowie Sade and the rest the tilm would nor nave sees hace er aone sold. Sade is in fact integrated very well (as Athene a nsine sc t Dowie tordr his undoubted charisma is just a distracting Bowie. Another problem which Temple has not really overcome is that any film which looks back to the fifties has to cope with the overwhelmingly nostalgic mode in which that period is now received in the cinema. From American Graftiti to Back to the ruture we are oven a coder age of innocence and prosperity Temple colludes with this tendency. He brings in old taces -ke alan -eeman c0e 101e Blair. He downplays Suzette's penchant for black men and the hem elance ote pornography trade. The fraught with his parents - Dameuc wiwh mus tauer blistering with his mother - - are turned into a jolly burlesque.

Of course lemple is nostaleic. a least dooul uis eany moment Ir youth culture. He is himself a product of punk and carries with him an inflated idea about the vilaily ane oobos uona boenta of the waves those early teenagers set in motion. This star-ridden, video-driven musica bapan io tasnion ang flash cannot carry the political weight to which it aspires. Too complications of generation and race which were upsetting the post-war consensus, in the end it gives us tne voting Hill roters as dancers. In Macinnes the language, characters and venetes or oncon e ce as stylised as in the film, but they are grounded in a much more disquieting psychological and Socid contex ine romantic Macinnes also expected too much of his teenagers as well as being ¡us dna mio ne diso wantee men to care, to be the conscience o1 the nation. He was 44 when he wrote the book and his old head is orten graungiy oovious on nis hero's young shoulders. The remarkable thing about the book s ts we oelcs fact that it mounted its critique Macinnes saw a space opening up trom which a tresh hent could sale vedstewt should have moved on, but if you just wanna have fun, you will.

Pat Ford the next step • 11 April 1986 • 9

Is porn OK for miners? AT a gay and lesbian march for the first time. I think it is good and hard hitting, but l want to draw your attention to two contradictory passages in the paper. In tns society which treats women like property, as child-bearers and child-rearers, and as objects of sexual gratification, the establishment will never be able to protect women The week before, in a feature on the miners Joan Phillios wrote: 'Last week a Yorkshire video offset the crippling effects of the strike on his trade by forming an "adults only porn club, received a heavy fine.'

Do you not see that there is some hypocrisy in objecting to women being used as 'objects of sexual отсто 0 te o t hand, and on the other pleading poverty as an excuse for someone who opens 'an adults only porn club'? It is mostly adults who rape, gang-bang, sexually abuse and degrade women from childhood to old age.

I feel I shouldn't complain because you mention the porn club in connection with the miners. But why should I feel l am risking 'street credibility by pointing out this hypocrisy? Is it because vou are dave esteem real workers'? Moira Durkin Stafford GLC goes to Edinburgh LAST week's article on the GLC is proving useful for our Edinburgh election campaign.

In the opening shots of its campaign to win control of Lothian Regional Council, Edinburgh Labour Party has promised to cut unemployment by setting up a GLC-style local enterprise board. Under the terms of the scheme, say its architects, company managers would decide on factory closures *according to the results of social audit, while workers employed by firms that were too far gone would be offered facilities so they could achieve some influence over the future' As last week's article showed, even 'Mr London' Livingstone could not make this work. His Greater London Enterprise Board proved disastrous for workers, with 20 firms going to the wall the dole. Edinburgh tns workers to ignore Labour's big lie, and to put their stake on the real fight for jobs. A vote for the RCP will say my money is on the class fight winning workers take al Andrew Gourley Edinburgh Write to

BCM JPLTD

London WC1N 3XX 10 • the next step • 11 April 1986

SVT. 479N

Labour's victims ALAN THORNETT'S TV film recently shown on BBC 2's Open Door, showed the 500 miners sacked during the strike as the victims of the bosses offensive. These men were 'paying the price of insubordination and, boy, are we going to make it stick, as MacGregor put it. But what about the NUM leadership, and the to which Labour Party - Thornett belongs? Have they not victimised sacked miners by turning their backs on them? The NUM leadership has neither set up nor proposed a rea camoalen to get inese men their jobs back. Thornett didn't mention this. Nor did he mention that NUM officials, from national to branch level, are now too busy pushing forward the coal board's productivity drive to even think about a reinstatement campaign. At one time Yorkshire Ban page 3 THE man who sold me tns 12 said that feminism is an important issue for communists. So why in your article on rape do you say that banning the Sun's page 3 would be an affront to the freedom of publication? What about the freedom of women? You go on to say the elimination of rape is linked to eliminating the abuse and assumed inferiority suffered by women Not a phoney war THE racists and the Bradford police agree that Workers Against Racism should stay out of the Heaton area of the city. Last week our door-todoor anti-racist canvass was met by 13 racists carrying baseball bats and bottles.

*Nigger-lovers out of Heaton, they shouted. We ran them out of the area. To emphasise our point we carried on the canvass. As we were leaving the police turned up. They told us they their patch. Last Friday night 30 War supporters continued the canvass. Police in vans and unmarked cars were waiting for us. They

LETTERS

leader Jack Taylor would tell us that all would be well as soon as we got a Labour government - the 500 men would automatically be he only time Taylor talks t the sacked men is to tell them to do their own collections al pil gates the NUM has nothing for them. They are an embarrassment to the officials. To bolster Labour's image, Thornett slipped in a reassuring interview with Tony Benn, who talked about his justice for miners Bill. No one I've talked to in the pits has been fooled by Benn's piety So what was Thornett's film all about? It was just a coverup for the victimisation of sacked miners by the NUM leadership and the Labour Party. Keith Hammond the miners' next step Yorkshire Exactly. That's why we need to ban the display of women as purelv sexua objects, so that women can be iberated. not protected If multi-nationals were banned from selling lethal goods to the third world, you wouldn't say that was a restriction of freedom. Can you not see the parallel with the Sun-style exploitation of women? Alison George Bristol threatened to arrest us if we cape on knocking on doors is an offence! We could be behind the rise in break-ins, they said. But they said nothing about the Asian family forced out of their home by bricks through their windows. The police finally arrested me or coneuce Kevio cause a breach of the peace'. War intends to carry on its work, despite the racists in and out of uniform.

We will breach the 'peace that has left Heaton Asians under siege. Kirk Williams Bradford War Manchester student struggles AT Manchester polytechnic the RCP students' leading a campaign in support of Bold colliery miners. But the students union executive is trving to stab the miners in the back.

Last year te union voted to donate £10 000 to the miners. In an attempt to evade the ultra vires laws, which prohibit political donations by students' unions the Labour executive recommended loaning the money to Bold NUM. In response to a letter of instruction from the official treasury solicitor, the executive now plans to call in the loan - the union officials' commitment to miners is thinner than a piece of writing paper The executive also claims offset the Tory cuts in union tacilities. Lett-wine croups at the poly talk about wanting having to put the students' union first. But the RCPSS, however, has convinced many students that the only way to beat the cuts is to fight the laws the tortes use to implement campaign against ultra vires, by defending rank and file miners from the effects of "left-wing' sectarianism.

Up the road at the university, the authorities have reinstated the three SWP students suspended after racist home office minister David Waddington spoke there last year. The three students were also suspended from their union.

but that didn't stop the SWP from supporting the union executive's plea to the authorities that suspension from the union was punishment enough. While the left appeared to accept the students' 'guilt", the RCPSS argued for the need to kick racists off campus. Twelve hundred students, sick of left-wing support for the executive's realism. agreed with us Unfortunately, after the left's pandering to the executive, many students have decided that politics is just a circus. In recent union elections the loony candidate polled the most votes. The university authorities could have shrugged off the executive's collapsing campaign. Instead they decided to be charitable. I'm glad the three SWP members have been reinstated, but the university's charitable feelings are no substitute for real anti-racism. Manchester society is loving quangoperson. efforts to Kinnock et al thoughts of Keith that upon wave of playing with yourself. expect Royal Ulster news Miss sympathiser and

EDDIE VEALE

STEPPING

OUT

Labour's Nick Ransford may be a yupplemiddle class Kinnockite But seems he doesn mind getting his hands dirty. The Fulham Lavour ran newsieuter boasts Ui aatour: clean the riverside up Crabtree, where 'broken prams, bundled newspapers and general litter are the unfortunate sights to be seen'. And, It proudly announces, 'Nick Raysford and prospective ward candidates are leading the clean-up fight! I hope they don't mear that lIterally. The spectacle of Natty Nick and his heavyweight celebrity canvassers Denis Healey, Claire Raynor, Glenys donning weilles and waving their behinds about as they pull broken prams from the river bed would really be 'an unfortunate sight to be seen.

If Raynsford's campaign has convinced you that Labour Party members are a brighteyed bunch of happy hipsters, read the Lichman, a left-wing The 1986 London Labour Party conference was the most depressing have been to for wasn't just the unrelenting discomfort of the GLC Brixton conference centre....lt wasn't just the psychological disorientation produced by the disemcontinually assailed the hapless delegates over the public address system.

It was the sheer irrelevance of socialism to the proceedings in the face of the wave masturbatory realism(?) heaped on us by the power brokers in the party. Which only goes to show that if you try to build socialism by playing the game to the Labour Party's rules, you end up I have here a picture-book called Macho, which 'shows how Communism tles in with me vatican plan to take over the nitec States'. The Vatican Is backing Moscow to win the third world war, 'so they elected a communist Pope from Poland and they ever Catholle worldwide The pamphlet become a Communist proves that turmoll In Cuba, Poland, E Salvador and Guatemala Is 'a careful plan by the Jesults' to 'eliminate' Catholics who don't like Rome's liaison with the Reds. This book of revelations is put out by Chick Publications. They also produce a booklet called The Next Step, which 'contains vital information for your Christlan growth'. So It is all a conspiracy.

A footnote to the Loyalist clashes with the Constabulary, provided by been 805001 arrested in the Midlands for armed robbery.

Bennett was a Loyalist supergrass granted immunity and a new life by the British authorities for giving the evidence that jailed 14 Ulster Volunteer Force members At a time when republicans were being jailed for centuries in supergrass trials, Bennett's case was another example of Britain posing as an impartial force re and But in December 1984 a 14 Loyalists were freed on appeal. There are now no Loyalists serving sentences on the word of supergrasses. British justice will always win through in the end Andy and Fergle are not alone. Miss Jane Buford has announced that she will wed Mr David Mellor. They met while she was recovering from a nervous breakdown.

the National Front Buford was Harrogate college students unlon president whose exposure caused a big row. She has since featured In Love Kills, a flim about Sex Pistol Sid Vicious. So, in spring 1986, even a young fascist's fancy turns to thoughts of love and marriage. Roll over, Nancy Spungen.

Over the last week we have been getting into gear for the 8 May council elections.

Supporters have been roaming the streets collecting nominations for the 38 candidates we re running for council seats from Glasgow to Brienton.

So far the only hiccup has been in East London. where we discovered at the last candidates was too young to stand, so we had to replace him. (Never mind Jim, there's always next year.) When we have explained why we are running for the council we have generally had a positive response, especially in areas where our candidates are already known and have a record of involvement in local campaigns. But some people are inclined to be cynical about elections. Many say they are fed up of politicians and electioneering, people who make promises that amount to nothing. Some of our supporters have been taken aback when people say, 'What you say in your programme sounds great, but what does it all mean for me now?' We have to be straight with people who want immediate answers to practical problems. Our candidates cannot

RACIST ATTACKS

This means War! Workers Against Racism has been organising with RCP supporters to take on the racists in cities where attacks are happening every day. Speakers from East London War and Bradford War will be discussing the politics and practical problems of the work at meetings around the country. All supporters Sou euce. To help our supporters become more familiar with our strategy and tactics, we are making available a selection of documents from the 1985 party conference. Although these documents were written a year ago, they antıcıpate developments in the labour movement and British politics which are only now Diary

REPUBLICAN POW CAMPAIGN

Prison Picket: Long Lartin, Sunday 13 April, 1.30pm

POLICE OUT OF OUR PRIVATE

LIVES - PROTEST

BRIGHTON: Friday 18 April Police tuam, sussex university. have been invited to speak at the Family Planning Association conference. We sav police should get out of our private lives, as well as off the streets distinguish themselves from other parties by making more extravagant promises. After all, RCP councillors elected on 8 May would be constrained by shortages of resources just as much as Labour or Tory councillors. The only promise that we can make is that we will refuse to accept the limits imposed by government spending limits. Our councillors would not give in to the constraints imoosed bv the svstem and settle for trying to share out the sacrifices more fairly. Instead they would devote their energies to organising all those who are ready to fight for more.

lo people who ask us to come up with immediate solutions. we should respond by asking them what we can do together with others who are ready to take on the system. The problem with leftwing councillors who have made great speeches about fighting the Tories and bold promises about Jam tomorrow is that they tried to realise their aims through conventional channels. For Liverpool council the way to get more money to build houses was accounting. For Lambeth and Sheffield it was by raising the rates. But • GLASGOW: Tuesday 15 April 7.30pm, Daisy St Neighbourhood Centre, Daisy, Govanhill • MANCHESTER: Thursday 17 April 7.30pm, Black Lion, Blackfriars St • BRADFORD: Tuesday 22 April 7.30pm, Checkpoint, 45 Westgate • NEWCASTLE: Thursday 24 April 7.30pm, West End Learning and Leisure centre (WELL), Elswick Rd Get the arguments taking shape. These three documents are avallable exclusively to 'signed-up' RCP supporters Revolution in our time perspectives for the RCP • What are we defending? perspectives for the official labour movement • The left Send £1.50 for the set to BM RCP, London WC1N 3XX

POLICE OFF THE STREETS -

PROTEST

NOTTINGHAM: Thursday 17 Anril 1.30mm County Hall. Trent Bridge. Protest at council backing for police harassment

ANTI-RACIST BENEFITS

NEWCASTLE: Thursday 17 April, 40 The Red House Quayside, with King Volts and NOTTINGHAM: Friday 18 April rent For students unlon Easterhouse LONDON: Monday 21 April, til late, 100 Club, 100

THE

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What are we promising?

RCP

CLASS

STRUGGLE IS

THE ONLY PROMISE OUR

CANDIDATES MAKE

juggling the restricted resources of local councils available funds to meet the needs of local people.

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MAY'86 • VOTE

REVOLUTIONARY COMMUNIST PARTY

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Deadline for news and reports: Monday 9am 01-729 3771 process of cutting here to spend there. Instead of fighting the cuts across the board, they ended up squabbling over where the axe should fall. The role of local councils today is not to build new homes and provide high quality services for people.

It is to share out the misery in the most equitable way.

This sort of conventiona council administration Liverpool or Tory Bradford _ is useless tor the working class RCP candidates demand a different sort of council as well as different specific policies. Our councillors will not play the role of creative accountants or back stage manipulators.

We are running for office to win the best possible platform from which to organise resistance to all attemots to impose austerity measures. Some people ask, 'Are you really concerned about housing or nursery facilities • or are you just interested in introducing a communist system?' For us there is no conflict between fighting to win the things we all need from this system, and fighting to bring in a system that can really ensure that everybody gets them. The people who run the existing system Name Address If you like what you read in tns become an Telephone Phone Fenna on 01-729 0414 or fill in openly admit they cannot afford to provide jobs and decent living standards. The only way we are going to get a decent life is by fighting for a new society.

We have to show people that there is no logical gap between our immediate demands and our long term perspectives. Our councillors will act as people elected to fight for the maximum concessions that can be extracted from the establishment. If the employers and the autorities say tney cannol or will not give us what we need, then we will have to organise to replace their system with one that can It is understandable that people should react with surprise or even suspicion when we knock on their doors over the next few weeks. Politicians especially left-wing politicians - have always failed to deliver the goods in the past and workers have paid the price. People will look at the examples of Derek Hatton or Ted Knight *If that's socialism, and say, we'd be better off without we need to entasist our distinctive approach, not only to win support for the RCP, but to create confidence in communism as an alternative to the capitalist system. Send to BM RCP, London WC1N 3X

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the next step • 11 April 1986 • 11

the next step They are taking on the whole township More than 600 black members of the Metal and Allied Workers' Union are occupying an engineering factory just outside Johannesburg. Last week Sipho D spoke to one about their struggle W hen management fired the chair of our shop stewards committee for "intimidating" workers who were working overtime, we decided enough was enough,' says a member of the Metal and Allied Workers' Union. "Every day for weeks the have been accusing Mawu of bosses intimidation. •We knew they wanted to provoke a strike so they could get rid of us. So instead of walking out we occupied the plant and demanded our chair was reinstated. The bosses refused. So we are staying.' The sit-in at the Barlow corporation, one of South Africa's largest industrial companies, is the latest in a wave of factory occupations by Mawu members. Two weeks ago, workers at Haggie Rand won a dispute over union recognition and wage increases after a three-week occupation.

The Haggie Rand victory was a great factory boost to black workers. Other occupations have not fared as well. Ten days ago a sit-in by Mawu and Pwawu (the Paper, Wood and Allied Workers' Union) at the Pan African Shopfitters in Germiston was smashed by police using tear-gas and dogs.

Police arrested more than 70 workers and charged them with arson and damage to company property. At least six ended up in hospital with severe injuries. The lessons of that defeat have not been lost on the Barlow strikers. "There are two reasons why we decided on a sit-in. First, the machines are here, so we are here with them. If the bosses send in the boers (police) they will have to break us from the machines. I don't think they will - they Report from South Africa like their machines more than us. Second, if we are inside the factory, the management can't fire us, lock us out and bring in a whole new lot of unemployed workers.

We know the bosses want us to be outside the factory.

Then their police, the SB (security branch) and the vigilantes can deal with us. But now we control the strike. But there is something else here which the Haggie Rand strike taught us. The Haggie workers' families set up support committees We are which provided food and money.

doing the same. You see, Barlow's are not just fighting us workers here in the factory they are taking on the whole of Alexandra township. Our shop stewards have set up a council which involves the Alexandra Action Committee, the young comrades, and families are The wives everyone. cooking us food. They are organising the people to get money from other workers Everyone in Alex is talking about Barlow's thanks to them. The bosses must realise that we inside are fighting for our communities just like they outside are fighting with us?

The determination displayed at Barlow's shows how black workers are meeting the challenge from their bosses. Barlow's is not only one of the leading industrial giants, its chair Mike Rosholt is closely associated with the business lobby urging president PW Botha to reform apartheid. But as economic conditions have worsened in recent months, the capitalist class finds itself with little room to manoeuvre. A new law now going through the parliamentary process shows the state is moving to tighten up its repressive controls on the black working class. weapon in the apartheid The armoury is called the Temporary Removal of Restrictions on Economic Activities Bill.

It is intended to give the state president the of the existing power to suspend ans minimum wage determinations, rules about safety, and health and working conditions in any industry if he deems it necessary.

The Bill is presented as a measure to raise efficiency by removing restrictive practices'.

In reality, it will enable the state to remove all the gains the black trade union movement has made over the last decade.

Under the guise of fighting unemploygovernment the wants create ment,

HELO

conditions in which factories will be cheaper to run, and where wages will be as low as employers wish. Botha is set to launch a on the black trade union direct attack in a fresh bid to re-create

HOVENCE

conditions in which the capitalists can enjoy the super-profits they became accustomed to in the sixties. The Barlow sit-in shows that the South African establishment has a long way to go before it can feel confident about its ability to contain black workers. Shop stewards' councils linking workplace and community struggles are being formed throughout black townships. As workers extend their struggles to involve whole communities, the words of one striking Barlow's worker sum up the new confidence of the black workers of "The management will not South Africa: break Mawu. They are not just taking on a sit-in. They are taking on the whole of Alex, our wives and families, the youth and other workers. If we organise, you can be sure.

they will not have it their way for too long.'