After the hunger LABOUR MUST MOVE FROM WORDSTO

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A TION Yet by the ment Tories ility, v All France USA : were suppor striker leader ment, expres hunge In teader ment Scotti resolu sions but ‹ The meeti BI TRADING on the agony and distress of the prisoners' relatives, the Tories have finally faced down the H-Block hunger strike.

The British government's denial of political status to the Republican prisoners in H-Block and Armagh was • calculated political option. ¡pecial status existed up to :976, and many prisoners in Long Kesh still have it.

The prisoners are clearly political - arrested under special laws, taken to special interrogation centres, convicted in special no-jury courts with special rules of evidence ... and prepared, one after another, to face slow, terrible death in a political protest for their rights.

Inflexibility

It silence and inaction • British labour movehave allowed the to maintain their of arrogant inflexibhile ten men died.

I over the world - in • and Spain, in the and Australia there big demonstrations in rt of the hunger rS. In Poland, the of the workers' moveLech Walesa, ssed his support for ir striker Bobby Sands. Britain, no prominent 's of the labour movespoke out. The ish TUC passed a ition calling for concesto the hunger strikers, did nothing about it. demonstrations and ings have been small. ut often before it has been a false triumph for a British government when it has beaten down Irish protest, killing republicans or allowing them to die. And likewise now.

International pressure on Britain to make some political move in Ireland has increased. In the South of Ireland, nationalist feeling has been revived and two hunger-strike MPs have been elected.

In the North of Ireland, huge, terrible pool of bitterness and fury has been built up in the Catholic community, and will pour out over the coming months and years.

And in Britain a jolt has been given to the labour movement. When Labour front bench Irish spokes. person Don Concannon told the dying Bobby Sands that Labour would never support his cause, thousands of activists were disgusted and outraged.

Over 50 resolutions supTho prison officers over such matters as visits to the toilet, the prisoners went on to the 'dirty protest'. refusing to wash or slop out.

Still no response. So, last October, seven H-Block prisoners started a hunger strike. They were joined by three women in Armagh before, in December, they ended the strike in return for some British government concessions.

The government reneged on the concessions - and there was littie protest in Britain.

So on March 1, the second hunger-strike started, demanding the right not to wear prison uniform, the right not to do prison work, free association, the right to organise their own education and recreation, and full remission.

The death of Bobby Sands MP on May 5 finally On the streets of Northern London E2. shocked the British labour movement into some response. The resolutions started coming in. Tony Benn came out for withdrawal of British troops (though saying they should be replaced by the UN).

But our movement's response was too little, too late.

The next stage in the bitter history of the prisoners' struggle is not clear. But there certainly will be a next stage, whatever limited concession the Tories now grant.

Our job in the British labour movement is to stir the Labour Parties from resolutions to action, and to extend the spread of support for Irish self-determination from the Labour Parties into the trade unions and workplaces.

*Political status now!

Troops out now!

!Self-determination for the Irish people as a whole! Ireland: still troops, still troops, tension