TARIO ALI - IMG candidatu in Sheffield, Atterdiffe Red Weekly: Why are you standing in the election?
TARIQ ALI: First let us get it quite clear that none of us is standing as individuals. We are all standing because the organisation of which we are meibers, the International Marxist Group. has decided that standing in the election is a useful way of getting across its ideas for dealing RW: Do you think this election will solve anything? Do you expect to get many votes?
JOHN ROSS: We don't have any illusions that elections decide fundamental questions. We are staading in this election as it way of getting our politics over to the largest possible audience. The last few years have shown beyond doubt that it is the struggle outside Parliament which i the key one. The last Labour government, for example, Increased unemployment, attacked the unions, passed racist laws, sent troops into the North of Ireland. But the struggle outside Parliament won the great victories of the 1972 miners'strike, the Frecing of the Penton ville Five, the strike of the Glasgow firemen. One of the main points we want to gef over in our campaign is precisely that the struggle outside Parliament is the crucial one and it must be continued against whatever government 1s elected.
As for votes, we know we won't get many votes. It will take many more strupgles before the mass of the working class becanes convinc. ed of the need for the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism. But we do think every vote cast for us will be a very significant vote. It will be a clear vote for the continuation of the strugale regardless of which party is elected, and a clear vote against the reformist leaders of the Labour party. The few hundred militants who will support this position now will become tens of thousands in the cars to come.
RI: What do you think are the key issues which face the working class in this election and in the months to come?
JOHN ROSS: We see the crucial issues as solidar ity with the miners and the other workers now in struggie, the iasues of prices and wages, unemployment, the struggle to defend the trade unions, how to organise for the struggle, the defence of picketing, the strugele for tbe liberation of women. the issue of racism, the question of the develogment of the strong state, the issue of Ireland, the sar in Vielmam and the question of how we are to go forward to socialism.
Red Wookly 15 February 1974 Page 4 RW: Taking these points one by one, what is your position on the miners and the other strikes?
TARIQ ALI: We have been campaigning for months for total victory in the struggle against Phase 3. We stand for complete solidarity with the miners, for a miners-engineers-railway men's alliance and for a general strike. We think these struggles must he won through mass picketing and mass action. This is a key point in the platformn we are standing on in the election.
RW: What about orices and wages?
BOB PURDIE: We stand for the defence of all working class incomes against inflation. There should be automatic wage increases for increas es in the cost of living. This demand has already been won in Belgium, for example. As for the 75 thresbold in the Government's Phase 3 proposals, we demand that the threshold be reduced to a nil norm and is extended to the whole of the working class so that every ur crease in prices leads to a wage increase. We also demand that all welfare benctits and grants increase automatically with price increases, and we work for the organisation of clalmants to gain their rights under the social security, We are for a total freeze on all rent increases and the non implementation and abolition of the Housing Finance Act, We also campaign for a national minimum wage of E30, for pensions to be raised to 80% of the average industrial wage. On prices we demand that local organisations of the working class be given power to stop price increases, we call for industria. action to be taken against price increases, as has already taken place in Thornliebank warehouse in Scotland, and we fight for the construction of a real workers' cost of living index to replace the biased official one. We are also totally opposed to the unions accepting uny incontes policy under capitalism, as this is simply used a a device for keeping down the wages of the working class. Wesupport the decisions of the ASTMS national conference and the AUEW national committee to refuse to accept an Encomes policy under any government.
RW: And unemployment?
BOB PURDIE: Unemployment is ouc of the worst effects of capitalism, It is a total waste ot the productive forces of socicty. No section of the working class must he allowed to suffer as a consequence of unemployment, The whole burden must be placed on the employing class In the case of threats to Lay off individual soups of workers, we call for a fight for work staring with no lose of pay. We fight for the reduction of the working sock to 30 hours with full pay so as to share work. We also call for work or full pay. If capitalism cannot cmplay a worker, it must nevertheleas continue to pay him full wages. We call for the nationalisation without compensation of any firm depriv ing workers of work.
RW: How do you believe the trade unions can best be defended against government attacks?
TARIQ ALI: In the long run the unions can only be protected by the revolutionary strugale against capitalism. The cruciai struggle now is for the independence of the unions from the state. This means the complete coding of the Industrial Relations Act and all anti-union egislation, no acceptance of incomes policy and no talks with the Government on incontics policy. Until this task cun he carried out we call for boycott of the National Industrial Rolations Court, non-registration of unions and no use of the machinery of the Act.
RW: What forms of organisation do JOHN ROSS: The most important things that every step is taken to ensure the widest possible participation in the struggle. That, for example, was decisive in the miners'strike in 1972. This can only be achieved on a wide scule if those actually engaged in the struggle take the decisions on the running and demands of the struggle. This means, in particular, the election of strike committees in struggle, regular mass meetings of workers in struggle, local, regional and national meetings of shop stewards to prepare strikes. This must be coupled with a campaigo for union democracy: for the election with right of recall, of all union nflicials, and for no union official to he paid more than the average wape of the workers be represents. Students and tenants must also be orgroised in support of the strugeles of the working class. In order to unite all chese furces locally we call for the establishment in every area of action committees and Councils of Action. On the question of picketing we are for the self-defence of pickets, and the use of the tactic of the Nyine pickets. We hellow that an cssential part of the defence of the right to picket is the campaien for the release of the three building workers imprisoned at Strewiniry, the reversal of their convictions and an end to the trials.
RI: What is your position on racism and immigration?
TARIQ ALI: Racism is at present the most powerful of all threats to the united strugele r BOB PURDIE - IMG candidate in Glasgow
ly already exists in the working class is being strengthened and fostered by racist poiticians of all parties, and by the fascist National Front in particular. As part of the struggle against ricism we call for the ending of all immigration restrictions and for the organisation of the black community for self-defence and for its organisation within the trade unions to fight for its interests. We are for driving the racists and fascists off the streets and preventing them orpanising. spark the working class. The racism which unfortunate RW: What demands do you fight for in the struggle for the liberation of women?
JOHN ROSS: The real Sheration of women can only come after the destruction of capital Ism-and even then there will still he a long struggle in the newly formed workers' state. In the struggle towards this, however, we call for contraception on demand, for free 24 hour nurseries, and for equal job and education opportunities for women. We support all the struggles of the women's liberation movement.
RW: What is your position on Ireland and the struggle of the IRA?
determination for Ireland. We call for the IRA against the British army, although we think its politics are inadequate for the needs of the struggle in Ireland.
RW: And on Vietnam?
TARIQ ALI: We are for total solidarity until the final victory of the Vietnamese liberation forces.
RW: What about the strong state and the continuous moves to undermine bourgeois democratic rights?
Jaws such as the Immigrution Act, the Aliens Act and the Pakistan Act, and the 1875 in strupale, so we are in lavour of the dismantlimp of the arcy and the police force and its replacement by an armed workers mibnia. We work toward this goal by Lighting for fall end to ult joint army-pelice mangoans, Mie wing thugs or the police. equal pay for women now, for free abortion and BOB PURDIE: We are for the total withdrawal of British troops from Ireland, We demand selfimene diate release of all Irish political prooners.
We completely solidarise with the struggle of the the police, the army, ete struggle?
JOHN ROSS: We oppose in purticular the racist Conspiracy Act, which was used to amprison the Shrewsbury Three. The forces of the capilatst state are the deadly enemy of the working chess trade union and politics rightin the arty, un abolition of specif repressive police forces like the Special Patrol Groups, and the establishinent JOHN ROSS - IMMG candidate in London, Newham North-East of self-defence forces to protect worken organsations and picket lines from attack by rightRW: How do you believe the working class can go forward towards socialism? TARIQ ALI: The first and most important thing to understand is that the working class. can never achieve socialism through Parliament or the capitalist state. Any government which attempted to hase itself only on the capitalist state and introduce socialism would be completely smashed by the ruling class. This would be done in the first place by coonomic sabotage, as in Chile, or as happened in Britain when the 1945-51 Labour government tried to nationalise the stcel industry, If this were insufficient to discredit or topple the government then the ruling class would not hesitate to overthrow the government by force. We have already seen this happen in Spain, Greece, Chile and muny other countries. The essential thing in the struggle for socialism is that it can only be achieved by the mass mobilisation and organisation of the working class, independeatly of the capitalist state and employing class, This means, for example, that nationalisation cannot be carried through on a wide scale simply by Acts af Parliament-the workers must be prepared and organised to lake over the firms from below. Any government, even one witl the best intentions in the world, would be economic- general strike. ally forced into carrying out anti-working class policies if it were not in a position to take cobtrol of the economy in this way. This would also enough to bruth them aide and replace them require the arming of the working claas against the inevitable violence of the capitalists, and the disarming of the forces of the capitalist stateRIV: What is your view on the relation between elections and the broad class BOB PURDIE: As we have already said, the decisive struggle is that outside Parliament the mass struggle, We judge elections from the point of view of the mas struggle, tot in terms of the Parliamentary game. Thus, where there is no revolutionary candidate, we call for a vote for the Labour Party, We don't do this because we place any reliance whatever on the reformist Labour leaders to defend the interests of the working class, but because of the effect the outcome of the election will have on the mass strugple. A victory for the Tories would he seen by the mass of the working class as a defeat, and of socialist measures from below, In any would lead to a decrease in the confidence and combativity of the working class. A victory for the Labour party, on the other hand, would be seco as a victory and would increase confidence and combativily. We therefore put forward the slogun Vote Laboar but rely only on your own Struggles: By the same reasoning we also call for a vote In the candidates of the revolutionary left where they are standing, ratber than the Labnur Parly, even though we know that the revolationary let cannot as yet defeat the Tones for their liberation, in the struggle against al the polls-e vole for a candidate standing for the revolutionary left is the clearest call of all in favour of continuing the struggle, no matter what Government is recurned at the election.
As for Parlimmentary clections themselves we explai that they are a fraud. Members of Parliament are elected for five years, those who sleet them have no right to recall MPs, and they are elected on an arhitrary geographical basts which has no relationship to the grea wits of production where the working class is arganised. Real power lies in the capitalist stat and the economy, not in Parliament.
This electiun is particularly fraudulent. It i simply an attempt by Heath to defeat the working class through a political manoeuvre sumething which ho has been unable to do In the open class struggle. We unty stand in these clections because they provide us with # plaitorin for putting forward our political A socialist democracy will not be based on Parliament, but on real workers" elections, on the democracy of workers councils. This is the Jong-term solution we fight for. You can already see the beginnings of such warkers' democracy in things like the mass shop stewards meetings beld in the AUEW to organise the last protest against the Industrial Relation Act, the mass mineıs" meeting which dealt witi the scabbing of right-wing official Frank Smitt in Leicestershire, elected strike committecs, ar the Councils of Action formed during the 1926 We only parlicipate in Parliamcutary elections because we are not yet strong with workem clections, and we try to partic ipate in Parliamentary elections hy working cia neans by calling for strikes, demon strations and cecorations during the election. RV: And after the clection?
JOHN ROSS: No matter whether a Tory or Labour Government is elected, they will continue the attacks ou the werking class dictated by capitalism But the means to end the capicalist olfensive are already being forged in the struggle. In Britain, the crisis of capitalist society is propelling the working class Lowards a gencral strike or sinilar contr ontation, no matter what government is in office. It is ahave all this for which we try to prepare the working clabs If the Tory Party is retumed we will call for the first aim of the general strike to be the overthrow of this goverment, and in the struggle to do this the way can he opened lo socialism. If such a struggle takes place when Labour is in office, we will cull for such a peneral strike to impose a programme case, of one thing we can be certain. None of the most important questions will be decided at this election.
The really decisive cents will be thie nass struggles outside Parliament which will take place before, during and after these elections. It is success in the strike struggle, in the combat against racism and fascism in the armed struggle against British imperTalism in Ireland, in the struggle of wornen the repressive acts of the strong stabe, Red Weekly 15 February 1974 Pao
In the present period of intense social upsurge the task of revolutionary student militants amount to more than rallying student support behind the struggles of the working class: it must include the development of the struggles in which students are directly involved to their full revolutionary potential-as part of the struggle for socialism.
It is within this perspective that the IMG has sought to further the struggle of students over the past period -against cutbacks in higher STUBENT UNION
----- pull-quotes -----
you think should be used in the struggle in the coming months?
andidates say Y THE VARD
TRUGGLE - TARIQ ALI, BOB PURDIE and JOHN G will be fighting for in the elections. The full adsheet, will be available from next Monday.