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Anti-racist

500 joined the LCI demonstration against Don Concann.

Writaback

THE LETTER from Jane Andrews and Jenny Morris (SO 45) raises a number of questions about the tactics of the Labour Committee on Ireland.

Firstly, Jane and Jenny aim their criticisms of the LCI a bit too widely. To take just the local example of Islington, LCI members were instrumental in fighting to get resolutions on i Ireland from two of the three local parties to Labour Party conference this year. In my own party (Islington South), LCI members got LCI policy including political status — adopted as party policy.

Having said this, there is substance is some of the criticisms that Jane and Jenny made though they shouldn't be used to write off the work of the LCI as a whole.

Not pushed Although the LCI's founding conference added support for immediate withdrawal and political status to its platform, those demands have never been consistently pushed by the LCI nationally.

A number of comrades in the national leadership feel that pushing the issues would 'ghettoise' the LCI and confine it to people already convinced about Ireland. In my opinion, Jane and Jenny are quite right to attack this view: It's only by fighting (in a non-sectarian way) to convince people who are vaguely uneasy about Labour bipartisan policy, and win them to a clear alternative, that we'll make progress.

Part of the problem behind this is that until now the LCI has been a bit top-heavy, concentrating on lobbying, with few active local branches. Only now is it really beginning to combine that with widespread grassroots organisation. One example of this was the demonstration on July 4th in Mansfield. Of the 500 people who attended, a large proportion were LCI activists with sufficient commitment to face the attack by the combined forces of the NF and Don Concannon's supporters.

This was the first time the LCI had organised such an event on its own, and it was generally felt that despite difficult conditions it had been a success.

Unfortunately, rather than follow it up, the National Council voted against a proposal to hold a demonstration at Labour Party conference.

Nevertheless the picture Jane and Jenny paint of a conservative LCI being by-passed is far from true. You only have to look at the resolutions to Labour Party conference this year..

Fight inside

The solution to the problems they raise is not denunciation of the LCI, but building it and fighting with it and within it tor the policies of political status and troops out now.

BRUCE ROBINSON, vice-chair LCI. in personal capacity.

ON SATURDAY 4th July, the day following the recent disturbances at Southall, I was driving past the remains of the Hambrough Tavern. I gave a friendly grin to sightseeing Asian people and called out, 'No National Front in Southall' A quarter of an hour later, as I approached the police station, I was stopped and my vehicle was surrounded by police.

I was accused to having shouted racially insulting slogans. I said that could not possibly be so because I am a socialist, antiracist and anti-Nazi. I was ordered out of my vehicle, which was driven off by a policeman.

Inside the police station I was questioned further. When I stated with some emphasis that I was a lifelong socialist who had no racial prejudices, I was abused and one of them said to the other, 'Stick him in the cell with the twelve nig-nogs' 'Yes please' , I said, 'put me' When they saw that that prospect did not alarm me, another one said, 'Put him in with the skinheads' and I was then shoved roughly into a cell where there were two young white men. They were not skinheads, and so far as 1 could ascertain had no political leanings.

Three and a half hours later 1 was charged with using insulting words etc. 'Am I entitled to ask what I'm alleged to have said' ', 1 asked, and a copper with a great big satisfied smile said, 'Oh yes, I'll tell you what you said, you said 'Support the National Front' • I said, 'You wouldn't get me to say that it you screwed my balls off' , but he just kept grinning.

In April 1979 I demonstrated with thousands of other people against the presence of National Front supporters in Southall. After witnessing Asian youths being chased and beaten indiscriminately by police, I made statements to the Indian Workers' Association and the National Council for Civil Liberties.

I am very proud of my half-Asian grandchildren. :

Would any people who witnessed my passing the Hambrough Tavern between five and six o'clock on 4th July please contact me at 567 5287 or give your information to any of the appropriate organisations.

Do not fail to picket the Ealing Magistrates Court on July 16, when the charged Asian youths will need your support even more than I do.

D. TOMSON, London W5.

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