Tebbit's other BIll ther

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fight for left-wing policies, despite massive SDP defections - and won.

With four million unemployed, war in the South Atlantic, continuing military occupation in Northern Ireland, one of the greatest arms drives in history, and capitalism lurching through crises unparalleled since the 1930s, now is no time to seek the virtues of moderation, consensus and a quiet life. The Labour Left must re-launch the offensive. paid below the minimum engineering wage.

Last February we got a 62 rise. This February he said he couldn't afford a rise and he would consider it again in July.

We know he is lying because those working inside now have had rises of up to £14.

It seems to be mainly young women on strike. Is that the case?

We are all women. The men in the toolroom didn't support us. We are not all young - some have been there 15 ycars, but most of the more active strikers are young.

We've had lots of support but we've been out nine weeks now and we need more.

*Donations should bo sent lo: c/0 1. Patson, 13 South Terrace, Witnash, Icamington Spa, Warwickshire. WHILE the blood and guts continue to flow in the South Atlantic, and the Tories refer with disapproval to the conscript nature of the Argentine army, Norman Tebbit is busy fighting it out with the TUC and the Manpower Services Commission to ensure a conscript scheme of cheap labour for 16-17 year olds next September.

The opposition to Tebbit's scheme is of course weak.

Quarrel

The TUC and the MSC have no real quarrel about the level of wages now that they have got Tebbit to agree to scrap the £15 wage for 16 year olds. That would be a little too embarrassing to Messrs Murray and Co. The point of disagreement now is whether the scheme should be voluntary nor not.

The TUC say that it shouldn't be compulsory because the training would be no good for people who didn't want to be there. Tebbit seem to be sticking to his guns. The reason for this is clear. Tebbit's scheme is not of course designed to train youth for work.

Even it it did train us, which it won't, we couldn't get a job at the end of the scheme, either because there are none to get or because employers would rather take on more cheap, subsidised labour.

Tebbit insists on the element of compulsion - in effect conscription -because the scheme is an exercise in political discipline on working class youth and the trade unions. The scheme will undoubtedly mean that the jobs of trade unionists are taken by cheap labour.

We must fight to expose and stop this scheme. The TUC has the power to stop the scheme by withdrawing its backing and coming off the MSC.

That should not be done solely on the conscription issue. The wages, too, are a very realissue for the youth on the schemes now and for those who are drafted into the new scheme. So is the fact that they won't get a job when they finish.

The TUC must campaign for full trade union rates anded his andalad are scheme and strict trade union control as well as unionising YOPs now.

We know from experience that they won't do that willingly. It is the duty of rank and file bodies in the labour movement, trade union branches, trades councils, Labour Parties (and their youth and women's sections) to fight to unionise YOPs workers and fight for real jobs on real wages for young workers.

Army

One of the organisations Tebbit is considering as possible suitable participants in the scheme is the army. No wonder he wants it to be compulsory. Who in their right mind is going to 'volunteer' to go to the Falklands and get their head blown off for $25 a week - with no insurance cover?

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1077. mass strikes mass demonstrations, mass pickets, crippled t BY THE 1970s the decline of British capitalism was becoming more acute, with the disintegration of the post-war boom. From the mid-'60s, moreover, the industrial militancy of the British working class followed an upward spiral and spread into new sections of workers, though without ever escalating decisively into a deeper political consciousness.

Strikes grew, membership soared and the defeat of the Labour government's In Place of Strife reinforced confidence and combativity in the economic class struggle.

government of Edward Heath which took office in the summer of 1970 was acutely conscious of the long drawn out failure of the, Wilson government to use its "special relationship' with the union leaders to redress the situation.

Consensus

The Tories promised a break with the consensusstyle policies which had characterised both Labour and Tory governments. since 1945.

Government would withdraw from intervention in industry. The capitalist begging bowl of state aid would be terminated. Capital would be galvanised by entry into the EEC and the infirm sectors would be left to go to the wall.

There would be no formal incomes policy. But the Tories would make a firm stand in the public sector, and the behaviour of the unions would be transformed through the use of the law. The Department of Employment was out -the law courts were in.

The TUC leaders had little inkling of this. Soon after the election Vic Feather told the NUT Executive, "Conservative economic policies are better than those of the Labour Party. We think the present government will do very many of the things we were wanting the previous government to do...

•I can knock on the door of lan McLeod as well as I can knock on the door of Roy Jenkins and get an equally friendly response ... I can knock on the door of Robert Carr and get a more friendly response than I got from Barbara Castle"

Feather's unilateral honeymoon was shattered by the publication of the Tories' Industrial Relations Bill. Among its proposals were: legally binding collective agreements, the outlawing of the closed shop, compulsory ballots and cooling off periods before strikes, restrictions on strikes and picketing and the establishment of a special Industrial Reltions The centrepiece was the system of registration, or state licensing of unions. If a union registered it got certain protection under the Act, but the Registrar had power over its rule. If a union refused to register then it would be open to a whole range of legal liabilities.

The TUC failed to take any immediate action. Instead, in the period October 1970 to march 1971, they ran a campaign of education and propaganda - which, however, did play a useful role in provoking discussion and awareness amongst the ranks.

The leading role in the first phase of opposition was played by the Stalinistdominated Liaison Committee for the Defence of . Trades Unions. The first one-day strike called by the committee, however, could mobilise only one hundred thousand.

On November 14, 1970 a LCDTU Conference produced a large turn-out and voted for a series of stoppages.

The first, on December 8, produced a turnout of over half a million. TGWU Regions and the AUEW nationally responded to pressure from below.

On New Year's Day 45,000 TGWU workers in Birmingham struck. The TUC's main drive was focussed on Parliament. They persuaded Labour to put down amendments to the worst aspects of the legislation and prostrated themselves before Heath, bellowing that they could do the job of controlling their members better without legislation.

But they called a demonstrtion in London in February 1971 where the depth of the growing resistance to Heath could be seen from the quarter of a million marching. On March 1 he Tories' laws there was an AUEW strike with a 1.5 million turnout; and on arch 18, two million stopped work.

The latter stoppage coincided with a special TUC conference called to discuss the TUC position on the Act.

By now it was dawning on the TUC ieadership that Heath meant what he said, that he was determined and capable of getting the proposals on the statute book, and moreover that his proposals were part of a coordinated strategy to weaken their influence.

The state would walk into their rulebooks, fine them if they failed to police their members and at the same time weaken their influence through reducing their members and finances by outlawing the closed shop.

The TUC were not prepared to unleash industrial action which in destroying the Tories might weaken their own position.

On the other hand they were deeply aggrieved that they were to be forced to serve capital without being paid their just time honoured reward. They were not prepared to give up the comforts of wage-slavery for a return to serfdom, and they felt that there was no necessity to do so.

They therefore adopted a centre position between open conflict and open collaboration.

The General Council put a seven point plan to the Croydon Conference. The next Labour government would be pledged to repeal the Act; affiliates would not sign legally enforceable agreements; unions would not cooperate with the Act's institutions or serve on any of the statutory bodies that would implement its provisions. These were quickly accepted.

More contentious was "strong advice' to unions not to register and the rejection of industrial APE!

action to stop the Bill becoming an Act. Many felt "strong advice was insufficient as a deterrent.

It was carried but overruled at the Annual Congress in September by a successful AUEW motion (carried against the General Council's advice) and replaced by 'instruct' This decision was of crucial significance. It meant that unions would be open to all kinds of legal action. In conjunction with the fact that the Act gave individuals, not the state, the right to take legal action, this created the preconditions for an explosion outside the state's political control, an explosion which was bound to occur sooner or later.

The TUC's policy of noncollaboration and non-registration at least provided some basis and legitimacy for the socialists to work on. The LCDTU, however, failed to take up the challenge. Dich It held another confe ence in April 1972 after t Bill was passed. It declar that 'only industrial acti would defeat the Act' al called for 'resistance a action" against payil fines or carrying out cor instructions. But despi another meeting in Ju and small scale industr action in September, never wielded again t influence of 1970.

Crippled

Crippled by the Stal ists' subordination of esle to pressure on t existing leadership, has never done so since.

Meanwhile, the Hes government had fac down the power workers late December and open up the New Year by drivi down the post workers, • to tight alone by the rest the union leaders.

After a nine-week sta the Ford workers were st back after a personal d between Ford Europe a Jones and Scanlon.. li

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