that was how the Sunday Times summed up last week's AUEW National Committee meeting in Worthing.
Certainly there were sighs of relief all rourid at the outcome of the meeting at least from the Government, the employers and Hugh Scanion.
THE STAKES Everyone knew that what was at stake in this year's NC was a lot more than the enemeers wane rates. The possible escalation of the struggle for the engineers wage claim was regarded as the first major challenge to the viability of Labour's 'social contract".
Scanlon's appareutly militant
stance on the claim shortly before the NC might have suggested that a 'storm" was indeed brewing: especially since it was in sharp contrast to the drift to the right by the rest of the trade union bureaucrucy.
But in fact Scanlon was only too willing to capitulate to the social contract. The only hitch was that he could not possibly afford to accept the employers' miserable offer, which last year he himself had described as "derisory'.
He cannot afford to lose his 'leftwing' standing with the rank and file, if he is to exercise any control over the militants, so his price for cooperation with the Government was an offer which would allow him to back down without losing too much LATEST OFFER He got this with the employers' Intest offer of C3.50 on the skilled rate this May, and a further C3.50 next May. Accordingly, he indirectly urged the NC to accept this new offer (having only a casting vote on the NChe was not forced to take an open stand).
The gap of one year between the two rises is obviously designed to NC could move to the right. Scanion had no alternative but to urge the NC to continue its refusal to recognise the National Industrial Relations Court, since non-recognition is the pillar on which the union leadership's "left" reputation has rested. Scanlon's only hope now is that some legal manoeuvre will pull him out of the mess.
The settlement of the pay claim will be regarded by thousands of mlitants as a sell-out. And it is a set-back not only for the engineers, but for the many working class militants who were hoping that the first major blow to the 'social contract would come from the engincers struggle.
But a sell-out is different from a defeat in struggle. Very few militants will believe that it was necessary to accept the employers offer, On the contrary, the fact that the employers upped their offer after such a short period of the overtime han confirins that there was a real prospect of victory, DOMESTIC CLAIMS Some 75-80% of engineering workers will soon be submitting domestic claims. Their main problem will be to ensure that the full £3.50 actually finds is way into the wage packets- which is not what the employers intend. Consolidation of bonus payments into the new, increased basic rate, and similar tricks, will be used to rob engineering workers of the full rise.
But if there is to be a real challengo to the employers, despite the national settlement, then the secure the 'year of industrial peace for struggles over domestic clums must which Michael Foot pleaded at the NC, have some unifying theme and be But there were limits to how far the co-ordinated nationally, The national, consenors conference, which has met in Manchester twice, should Immediately be recalled to co-ordinate such action.
Many wage demands submitted locally, the convenors conference should workers will be left to fight alone, as the Manchester engineers were in fought for by every group of engincers is a straight-forward £3.50 across the board. Furthermore, the original demands of the national claim on shorter hours, longer holidNIRC: underway in London.
Whatever the specific details of ensure that no section of engineering 1972. The very least which should be ail domestic claims should incorporate Hugh Scanlon has come out with a phony radical' line of defying the sequestration threats of the Industrial Relations Court. But he offers no way of organising the struggle. These are the steps necessary to build mass action to SMASH THE *For a nationul, indefinite strike by all engineering workers. No matter what the AUEWexecutive decides, this must be got underway immediately in every district.
*For muss solidarity actions by every other group of workers: strikes, demonstrations and rallies in every area.
"For the physical defence of AUEW property from any attempts at seizure by the courts, London Trades Councis should summon an emergency conference to get this *Force the Labour Government to scrap the NIR and block all legal proceedings under the Industrial Relations Act, pending its speedy repeal. ays and equal pay for women.
But it is clearly not sufficient to simply slap in claims for better wages and conditions every year. Engineering militants must fight to ensure that it is the employers who are forced to accept economic res ponsibility for the economic problems of capitalism-not the workers.
The demand for a sliding scale of wager automatic wage rises to compensate for increases in the cost of living) seould be incarporated into all domestic claims as the central demand for a real fight against the effects of inflation, The last convenors conference talked about not easing up in the fight against the employers. The only way to carry such words into action, in the face of the.NC sell-out, is to orginise national strike action for demands such as these.
blood, and last week's mocting, when the Cleghurn cuse was undoubtedly discussed, was no exception, However, a doctor who has worked with Cleghorn in South London admitted there had been a previous incident when he hud made an outrageous statement to the press which had had to be quickly hushed up.
Members of the NWLondon Branch of ASTMS/MPU who are extremely suspicious of Cleghorn's arguments, and the special subcommittee will be meeting Cleghoro shortly and demanding to se and make pubic his supposed scientific evidence.
OTHER UNIONS There is certain to be activity from other unions, too. Cleghorn is much disliked at the centre in Edgeware for his 'autocratic attitudes, and workers there have commented on his overtly racialist jokes. He is anti-union, only tolerating them because it is official DHSS policy Already, the students unions of St Albans and Willesden Techs have put out statements of intent not to donate any more blood to Cleghorn's unit. At the United Biscuits Factory in Southall the clinic ourse has said that more than hall of their donors were coloured, and she doubted that they would want to continue giving The matter was raised at Brent Trades Council last week, and many delegates said their union members were disgusted at Cleghorn's behuviour. One delegate said that he eagerly awaited the information in the MPU Joctors' report, which will be available to all unions, to provide a basis for action.
But we must not rely on this, since Clegborn may refuse to reveal his data. In that case, workers should take whatever direct action is neces sary to secure the records and revcal what they contain, Meanwhile, the transfusion centre should be boysotted by all donors, RUTH ROWLEY
TODAY IN CHILE 50,000 men and women are languishing in the prisons of the dictatorship. Many of them are subjected to tortures developed by the Gestapo and perfected in anti-insurgency training camps in the United States. Even the most minimal trappings of bourgeois democracy have been scrapped by the Chilean generals, Yet the Labour Governmentin sharp contrast to the resolution carried by the last Labour Harold Wilson's statements:
the side of their oppressors.
extension of this war into North Vietnam?
Party conference and the speeches of many top Labour leadershas agreed to supply Ingates and submarines to this vicious, bloodstained regime.
This decision will come as no surprise to anyone tamihar with the history of the Labour PartyThe foreign policy of a government is, in the last analysis, an extension of its domestic policies. That is why the Labour Party, when it comes into office, always sheds whatever leftist" clothes it may have donned while in opposition.
This has been the case with every Labour Government, including It was right to issue a warning to the Tory Government not to go any further in the subordination of British policies to the United States. I believe at the moment the danger to a negotia• ted settlement in Asia is provided by a lunatic fringe in the American Senate. Asia, like other parts of the world, is in revolution, and what we have to learn today in this country is to march on the side of peoples in that revolution and not on (Daily Worker, 5 May 1964)
Will he (the Prime Minister) make it quite clear—as we asked him to make it clear in March-that we would not support any (Hansard, 30 June 1964)
1 have said a number of times in the House, and my Right are selfish, depraved, dissolate and happen." brief, as follows:
ISES. decadent. These upper classes look to the Hritish army and the British people to protect them against the just wrath of the people who have heen fighting underorder. ground against them for the past four years. We must see that this does not That delegate was Denis Healey. the Chancellor of the Exchequer in the present Government. The passage of time and the lure of office cured him rapidly of these wild fantasies.
The actual record of the Labour Party in its finest hour was, in • It carried on a struggle against the Greek anti-fascist resistance and paved the way for US intervention in 1948 to crush the local commun * It carried out a brutal and vicious persecution against communist guerrillas un Malaya. It was here that the "strategic hamlet' concept used widely by the Americans in Vietnam was first developed. British soldiers had themselves photographed with the decapilated heads of their victims lying at their feet as souvenirs. Labour minister John Strachey personally went to Malaya to congratulate the British Army.
•Te intervened in Kores under the leadership of US imperialism in order to try and defeat the recently triumphant Chinese revolution.
* It imposed a blockade on fran for nationalising the Ango-Iranian Oil Company. This blockade weakched the nationalist Mossadegh regime and enabled the CIA to organise a coup to restore the powers in the coup that overthrew Nkrumah. In Ireland, Callaghun, then Home Secretary, was responsible for sending in the troops to restore 'law and TODAY-CHILE The present Lahour Government lias openly disregarded previous statements and pledges over Chile, But it has heen forced to do so with a bit more subtletly than it adopted over Vietnam or Rhodesia.
The reason for this is that opposition to the military dictatorship in Chile is much broader and widespread than that which existed to the war in ic and social crisis in Britain itself has done much to ensure interest throughout the trade union movement in the struggles of the Chilean workers. More important, perhaps, has been the blatant nature of the Chilean coup. Given the hold of reformist ideas in the British labour movement. it has been easier for many workers to come out against a coup which overthrew a democratically clected Govarument than to identify with the armed struggle of communists in Vietnam.
Moreover, the Chilean experiment was long hailed by all those both social democratic and Communist Parties-who believe in the 'Parliamentary road' to socialism These organisations were thus forced to mount some protest against the bloody termnation of this experiment by the Chilean military All this creates the possibility for building a solidarity movement in this country that can attract great support from within the working class movement, The destruction of the Chilean trade unions, and the systematie murder and imprisonment of leading trade unionists has already had a big impact on militants in this country.
It was for these reasons that the Labour Party leadership felt obliged to invite Allende's ambassador to Britain to address the last Labour Party conference, despite the fact that the Tories recognition of the Junta had deprived him of any official status.
The Labour leaders, insular and chauvinist to the core, have made great play of the fact that a foreignes was actually allowed to address a Labour Party Conference. After all, it was only the second time in 40 years that this had taken place! (The last time was during the Spanish Civil War, and the 'foreigner" in question the Spanish Communist Party leader 'La Pasionaria')
It is also because of this sentiment inside the workers' movement that Lubour Party Secretary, Ron Hayward, and numerous Labour MPs have spoken out against the Government's position, The open criticism made by a member of the