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Election fever THE crude anti-union offensive by the Tory press, coupled with Thatcher's union-baiting, indicates that an election cannot be too far away. The Tory calculation is based on the mounting tide of industrial unrest which threatens the ability of Labour to pose as a government which can keep the workers in their place. The lorry while popular with the City of London and the International Monetary Fund, is not the best possible way to win votes. Even trade unionists not known for their militant views are likely to be alienated by the use of troops to deal with the public sector strike invoked a state of emergency was Edward Heath, a fact which cannot have escaped Callaghan, Healey and their colleagues.
on the following logic: the measures we propose are tough, but they are equitably applied. We all have to tighten our belts, because the system is facing a crisis. The only option is the Tories, who will be infinitely worse and will preside over a return to the Thirties with longer dole queues, legislation, etc. These arguments have been accepted by a large majority of trade unionists and workers for the last four years. One reason why they have been accepted is because the mass of coracs venuinely see no anernauve new mood is emerging. If the hysterical attacks against the lorry drivers fail, then the stage will well and truly be set for a confrontation between the Tocamen. situation by calling a spring general election.
Labour's present policies exists. One reason for the delayed dosely connected with the political abdication of Benn and Foot as left social-democrats.
Cabinet than to lead a fight inside the Labour Party. The result has een that Callaghan has been able to disregard completely the view of the Labour Party on all issues where the latter is in disagreement ein zovernment polcies. activists are in a state of serious demoralisation, and real membership figures are continuing to decline.
Labour's election manifesto is being carefully vetted by 'allaghan and his cohorts. But what about those who will go socialist measures could begin to resolve the crisis in our favour.
activists must ensure that the intervention of the troops is not able to defeat the strike. An emergency TUC Congress should be called with the express purpose of defending the public sector workers and organising national solidarity.
back on every front. We do not believe that such a struggle can only be carried on inside the Labour Party. Nor do we believe that the task of revolutionaries can simply be to enter, for all practical We have, wherever possible, to offer a socialist alternative at the polls.
disregard their conference decision and not to put up candidates is an impressionistic response to the present political situation. Socialist Unity candidates have already been nominated in a number of constituencies. A national conference of Socialist Unity has been organised on 3 February to discuss our election intervention. We urge all activists likely to be involved in our campaigns to attend.
Distribution/ Advertising tanker drivers followed the Ford workers; the rail drivers are aking militant noises; and Callaghan's economic and social cies could receive the final blow in the event of a public sector Labour politicians are aware of the fact that strike-breaking, - not to mention states of emergency. The last politician who The strategy of the Labour government has hitherto been based means tests, anti-strike This situation is now beginning to change. Slowly but surely a workers That is why Callaghan might try to defuse the but ine race remains Inat no mass ponnical alernauve 10 ponse to government policies has been the cringing class laboration of the trade union leaders over the last years -varded, in Scanion's case, with a peerage! This failure has been Benn carefully refused to organise any fight against the Labour vernment. He felt that it was more important to remain in the All ine indications are inat party locking on doors and driving old-age pensioners to the polling hs? Have they no say at all? Clearly a delegate conference ould be called to discuss Labour's election manifesto. Socialists the Labour Party should draft an alternative to that which is ing prepared by the leadership in order to demonstrate that In the event of a public sector strike before the elections, union What Labour's policies demonstrate is the necessity to fight The decision of the Socialist Workers Party leadership to THE October 1978 report of the Price Commission into the road haulage industry suggested a picture of chummy tranquillity in the sphere of industrial relations:
"The fact that the typical firm in the industry is a small one, and that even the large firms are organised into small UNILS. COTEE DULeS to family atmosphere in which mutual accommodation of differences is possible.
In such a situation, where employees are only in small groups, and even then mainly working beyond the control of the depot, they will themselves seek to settle problems amicably with their employers rather than involve a trade union."
The report goes on to note that the number of days lost through industrial disputes in the industry as a whole has been relatively small'. So it seems strange that it is conflict in this self-same industry which is now said to be threatening the whole fabric of decent society Britain.
But two statistics summarise why the lorry drivers' strike is now supposedly threatening food supplies, newspapers, and countless manufacturing industries.
On the one hand, 85 per cent of total tonnage transported in this country is moved by road; on the other hand, the basic wage of the drivers varies from £50.09 to £53.35. This means that drivers who work - no overtime take home less than £35 a week.
The employers, in the form of the Road Haulage Association, have offered an increase on the basic rate of 12.5 per COLL benefits would bring the offer up to 15 per cent, but the drivers are claiming an increase on the basic of 20 percent.
Forgetting the headlines in the Tory press about holding GUY the country to ransom', 'state of siege, "mindless militancy', and the rest, the case for the drivers is completely able.
As the Price Commission report testified, "average hourly earnings...have mained significantly below those for manual workers in industry as a whole'.
The RHA has been quoted as saying that it cannot increase its offer because of the government's pay policy. It says that the Price Commission has already criticised the industry for pricing, and the Commission has recommended they should not be allowed to Phan here ral are re general rate of inflation. mployers, if they pay more argue the employers, than they have offered and cannot increase their prices to cover the increase, bankruptcies will follow.
In fact this argument is spurious. the Price Commission does say is that *costs within the industry are generally greater than those which ought to be incurred by efficient suppliers.
For instance, the report criticises the industry for the general lack of interest among all but the largest firms in the positive promotion or selling of their services and in gencra forward planning of their business' Elsewhere in its report the Price Commission notes that lorries often lie idle, that the vehicles are often empty on return journies, and that firms to which goods are delivered often increase the COSt themselves by having out-ofthe-way depots or very Combine)
workers movement.
Hospital Occupation Committee)
* And more! (All speakers in a personal capacity)
Saturday 24 March at Digbeth Civic Hall, Birmingham N1 2XP.
restricted delivery times The situation is made worse by proliferation companies in the industry; as the report says, •Ine profes sional road haulage industry is fragmented into a very large number of small units So characterises the of planning, inefficiency, and low wages. Even profits are not particularly high.
And yet here is an industry which controls 85 per cent of its market and is so large that it employs 275,000 people.
Seen in this light the lorry drivers' strike goes beyond the immediate issue of a justified wage increase. The industry as a whole is a good illustration of what is wrong with the way this society is conducted.
It is not that the country is being held to ransom', but that private enterprise inevitably means waste, inetticiency, anc near chaos If there was a centralised road haulage system, if there was planning on a national scale of the transportation of goods, if there was a common wage structure for the industry whole, then conditions ab d would improve remarkably.
It would mean, for instance, that a lorry which took goods London Glasgow would not come back empty. It would mean the average vehicle is working for only one-third of the week', as the Price Commission reports is happening today.
All such waste could be done away with if there was one road haulage company that was planned on a rational, efficient, co-ordinated basis. If, in other WOTES. INCUSEE nationalised.
SOCIALIST CHALLENGE TRADE UNION CONFERENCE 2 Our alternative to Callaghan *The Lucas Experience, with Phil Asquith (exec. member, Lucas • Workers Control in Iran, with a speaker from the Iranian * Closures and Workers Control, with Carl Brecker (Hounslow Tickets El from SC Trade Union Conference, PO Box 50, London Our socialism will be infinitely more democratic than what exists in Britain today, with tull rights tor all pontical parnes ano currents ta do not take up arms against the socialist state. The stalinist models of 'socialism in the USSR and Eastern Furope have discredited socialism The interests of workers and capitalists are irreconcilable on a world scale. Capitalism has not only created a world market, it has created scale. This units will in the long run be decisive in defeating both the In Britain it implies demanding the-immediate withdrawal el British-troops *Euro-communist nor the pro-Moscow wings have an meaningtut strategy for the overthrow of the capitalist state,lew resolutionar socialist parties are more necessary than ever before. Conditions today