[Literature we've got in our Ibraries and how…]

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Literature we've got in our Ibraries and how it can be =500ec I is also lookposse tity of a 2050:00: 2200 *bich could be moved around to various places in the borough.

We've got some openly gay workers in the Social Services department who Fart to do some work with councillors on the social senices department. There's a group of lesbians = social services who are SPARTACIST Truth Kit -& 68-page analysis by John. Lister, published by the Workers' Socialist League. $l plus 25p postage from WSL, PO Box 135, London NI ODD. ference, Box 15, 164-6 Hanging Ditch, Manchester M3 4BN.

WOMEN, Immigration and Nationalits: meeting to discose our future as a campaign. Sunday March 13, 1.30 to 4.30pm, County Hall, London SE1. All women welcome. Creche on premises.

LABOUR Committee on Ireland: annual general meeting 1983 will be on April 23. Resolutions to be in by March 19.

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The Tebbit proposals would replace mass meetings by postal ballots urn, right now is the best time for heads of the activists with passive 'he new proposals have two main based on the secret postal ballot. The ectives. central target here is, as usual, indusangements so that power is central- the direction of a US-style depoliticised din a leadership which deals over the union movement by trying to cut unions' John Mellroy looks at Tebbit's plans for his next round of anti union laws, the thinking behind it, the response of the top trade -nine landana and santano Alaa union leaaers, ana wnat tne inreinn race aneuiar milet ho THE NEW Green Paper produced by Norman Tebbit is a "consultative document". That means that it outlines a broad range of possible changes in the law government trade unions and discusses which would be most helpful from the point of view of the Tories and the employers.

Comments from employers may be useful, but judging by past performances, Tebbit will go ahead with the guts of his own proposals with only marginal streamlining. Reading between the lines, and taking account of nuances and emphases, you can see which, of the long list of suggestions, are those that the Tories favour most.

It is unlikelv that a Bill based on these MY AT CrAT proposals will be introduced before the General Election. But Tebbit has said it is possible if Thatcher does not go to the country before 1984.

In this sense the Green Paper is an important part of the Tory Manifesto. It would provide a central ingredient of the legislative programme for a second Thatcher government - a programme which could transform the face of British society.

The Green Paper is the third stage in the Tories' attempt to use the recession and the weaknesses within the unions to set them within a permanent straitjacket. Phases one and two, the 1980 and 1982 Employment Acts, attempted:

•To weaken the unions' defend their members by severely limiting legal rights to picket and take industrial action.

L To undermine rank and file controls within the unions by concentrating power at the top where it is more easily moulded and controlled by making unions responsible as organisations if their members break the law.

•To sap the strength of union organisation itself by breaking the closed shop and giving non-unionists up to $25,000 compensation if they are sacked.

•To demoralise the membership particularly the weakły organised, by cutting back on basic minimum rights to unfair dismissal, redundancy and maternity protections.

•To cow the membership and discipline the unemployed by cutting back on rights to unemployment and social security benefits.

Now Tebbit, reflecting on experience since 1979, thinks "It's a piece of cake. Resistance from the unions has been minimal. I'm really on form and Lady Luck is smiling on me. I might as well press on. After all with no sign of an upt tak: ing candy from a baby."

obje 'irstly they aim to follow up the 1982 trial action.' : by restructuring internal union Act arri iser links with the Labour Party - and in the members through a system of referenda process to bankrupt that party.

To achieve these objectives the Green Paper is intended to mobilise backward elements in the unions. The Tories will Secondly, they are intended to push in use the right wing regimes in the AUEW and the EETPU as examples of how far it is possible to go in the direction Tebbit 5p if sold separately desires and as Trojan-Horses within the ranks of labour. And the Tories also aim to promote a much strengthened Federation of Tory Trade Unionists as a pacemaker for the acceptance of these ideas by sections of the rank and file.

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What Tebbit recommends Democracy is not just voting, but information and participation Din the end secret ballots organised by 'independent scrutineers' to be the means of electing representatives "at most levels within a union"

•More immediately the chief officers of the union (General Secretary and/or President) where they are already elected, not appointed, should stand for election in a postal ballot every five years.

•At the same time legislation would require that all union executives be periodically elected by secret ballot.

•No changes are suggested where officials are appointed.

•Unions might have to register, as under the 1971 Industrial Relations Act and have their rules vetted to make sure they followed these requirements.

•Alternatively individual members might be given the right to sue a union which did not meet these requirements.

•A new range of remedies would be needed for unions which did not comply. Union assets might be frozen or the union might be deprived of the very limited rights to take industrial action dom 110: turned into a test of union solidarity or so JOHN HARRIS col eih2i

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