This weekend the Troops Out Movement holds its national delegate conference, at a time when the need for consistent work on the Irish question is more vital than ever.
In the past the TOM has been very much to the fore of such work. Cutting across the chauvinist ideas of the Communist Party - which in calling on Britain to reform' the Six Counties, denies the right of the Irish people to self-determination - the TOM has gained impressive support within the working class movement for the twin demands of Troops Out Now' and 'Self determination for the Irish people as a whole.
The latest initiative of TOM, a mass labour movement delegation to Ireland, provides an example of this support. Already it has gained the sponsorship of 13 Labour MPs and many trades councils and trade Members of the IMG at the TOM conference will be arguing that the delegation must be planned in a way that allows the development of much more consistent work in the mass organisations of the working class - the trade unions and the Labour Party. The aim must be to establish TOM support groups which would organise and regularly agitate on the Irish issue in the unions, CLPs etc. This would enable the movement for Irish self-determination to become much more integrated into the life of the mass organisations, overcoming TOM's previous tendency to separation and isolation in this respect. Detailed To ensure an impetus for such initiatives, this TOM conference must agree to a detailed agenda for the delegation, establishing precisely where it will go and who will be invited to address the delegates. Already the vagueness of the delegation's agenda has been used by supporters of the Communist Party in a number of trade union branches to argue that it will be fixed so that only those who support TOMor sympathise with it will be met. The only way to answer such slanders is to work out and circulate a detailed agenda now.
to the delegation. IMG delegates and trade union sector conferences the delegation returns.
be an open conference for members of the Labour Party - which the ago. From such conferences and report-backs the various support groups could be established would both widen the intervention of TOM and help to build the movement generally.
all, is a series of concrete realisable presenting such targets to the TOM conference; and as a sign of the seriousness with which the IMG regards work on this issue, we will be contributing significant resources months.
The same detailed planning should be made with regard to the follow-up will be arguing for a series of regional to take place as soon as possible. after The major such initiative should TOM agreed to hold. over six months which •North of Ireland.
What the TOM needs now, above targets. Members of the IMG will be Orange ascencaney to building both TOM and the Labour movement delegation over the coming Some 1,500 women and men are held in prison camps in the North of Ireland as nostages by britisa mupertausin The vast majority of these political prisoners are members of the Republican organisations, and the price of their reease is the surrender or the anti-imper ialist resistance and acceptance of the British Government's schemes for the return of a Stormont-type regime in the Six Counties — a regime that, because of the undemocratic sectarian character of this Northern statelet, can only be based on Loyalist dominance.
All kinds of harassment and brutality have been bome scuboomy D CaE political prisoners; and their determined voice raised consistentlv in defence of thi anti-imperialist struggle has been an important element on many occasions in rallying support for this struggle. This act nas nor been lost on wer ya-ree and the Labour Government, with the result that as trom 1 marea tais year political prisoner status (or special category status, as the official jargon des cribes it) was abolished.
Rees hopes to isolate the political hostages from the anti-Unionist working class by branding the former as crimi nals. This forms a central part of the Labour Government's general strategy of depoliticisation of the struggle in the Dominated According to Rees, "the rule of law will be imposed impartiallv through thi courts': But as we have repeatedly pointed out a men week the Normer LsE courts are dominated by servants of the Furthermore, British 'democracy' has ensured mat me rule orlaw in une Six Counties will be administered by the sectarian novar dister constantary ano Ulster Defence Regiment, the armed wings or the boyaust ponucal parces It is impossible to overestimate the impact that the removal of political status will have on both the prisoners and the anti-Unionist working class. Not onlv will the prisoners face isolatior from the nationalist community, but inside the prison camps they will alse be isolated from each other. JOHN MAGEE reports from Belfast the brutal assaults which are continuous ly being made by prison screws and Brit ish soidiers It the anti-unionist working class car be convinced that the opponents of imperialism are gangsters', then British imperialism will be well on its way to securing the defeat of the Republican struggle that it has so unsuccessfully sought over the last seven years Leadership It will hasten the moves being made to get the RUC back into the nationalist ghettoes, and open the door to the in vo vement or me won in shese areas Five hundred UDR personnel are being tamed in not control a summer camp in England over the next few months, and only the totally naive would believe that this is to equip them to deal with Loyalist mobs Despite the importance of this latest attack on the political hostages une leadersarp or the repubncan organisations have made no effort to mobilise the anti-Unionist working class in defence of the prisoners. The Official leadership presents only a deafening silence. The Provisionals resort to retaliation against individual prison officers, which only leads to further aggression against the prisoners and efforts to split the militants of othe Republican organisations from their Provisional comrades In this situation, a petition has been launched by the People's Democrac and supported by the Movement for a Socialist Republic (Irish section of th Fourth International) in defence of DolLical Stacus Both groups see the petition as a means or begunning to moonise suppor within the ghettoes and laying the foundation for a mass campaign in def ence of the political hostages, and for meir release to unis ene meemnes are planned in all the different areas to establisa committees wme can organis support for the campaign.
the need for wavernatonal support for this campaign cannot be overstressed The only 'criminals in Ireland are th agents of British imperialism and its
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BOB PURDIE reviews Northern Ireland: the Geoffrey Bell (Pluto, £2 paperback).