Leadership is the key to rank and file consciousness

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example used by Mcllroy is the miners. But he leaves opens a reply to John Mcllroy's recent serie!

of articles in Socialist Organiser on the state of the industrial Mcllroy, Richards argues, minimises the role of leadership. Bu 'the central problem was and is the leadership given, not the rank and file. It is certainly true that betrayals can have a cumulative effect on workers' attitudes over years. But the problem remains one not of consciousness of the rank and file, but of leadership".

THERE are advantages and disadvantages in the fact that the series of discussion articles by John Mollroy on the state of the class struggle spanned five weeks.

The disadvantage was that so much space was allocated to an analysis which played down the role of the union leadership in the defeats, setbacks and retreats which have occurred.

But the advantage. was that even during the publication of Mellroy's analysis events in the class struggle were showing it in practice to be defective. By week five, the first part of the article - which said that any movement by the mirers against closures 'is unlikely in the short term" - had been demolished by the developing mass strike spreading from the South Wales coalfield, only to be bètrayed by the leadership's call for a ballot.

A confrontation at national level between the miners and the Tory government would have dramatically changed the political situation in the country, including the situation in the Labour Party. The betrayal has allowed the Tories to run rampant over the working class.

Ironic

It was bitterly ironic that at this very high point of leadership betrayal Socialist Organiser was completing Mollroy's four-part series minimising the role of leadership.

There are two central themes to the articles. Firstly, the argument that the industrial downturn is nnt enlalu Anato tha loadar. LUV OUITIJ UnE VU VIE IcaltIship but also to the state of consciousness of the working class.

And secondly that we need to "politicise" struggles through the Labour Party. Mellroy even goes so far as to say that this is what is happening anyway, through workers joining the Labour There is also a third strand of argument, which directs away from the necessary programme of transitional demands through which we as Marxists must connect with and raise the present-day consciousness and struggles of the working class to the level of grasping the need for revolutionary leadership and revolutionary mass action to resolve their problems.

Accepts

Leadership. Some the examples used by John Mellroy to argue that "in today's conditions the rank and file share many of the ideas of the bureaucrats" must be analysed.

I think the problem is that in nuraning euch on wadur i Mulouliğ sulli all argument Mellroy himself accepts the same nreconcervea position of the 'left' bureaucrats _ that the rank and file are to blame for the situation. They then look round for 'facts" to bear this out.

The main example used by Melroy is the miners. de wives wit lalt bilal wity Ho nitoo tha font that than voted for strike action in 1972 and 1974 but not in 1982 in the ballot on jobs and wages. On top of this he adds the Kinneil decision.

But he leaves out the background which shaped those decisions. In 1972 the miners were one of the lowest paid sections of the working class — getting a little over half the wages of carworkers. Today they are among the top paid manual workers, well ahead of car workers.

In 1972 and 1974 the NUM was led by a right winger. When the right wing lead a strike, the left wing supports it. But when thé left are in the leadership they invariably face sabotage from the right wing.

In the 1982 wage review, miners had already been offered 8% - more than almost any other section got, and without a strike.

On top of this, coal stocks were huge, there was a personalised witch hunt against Scargill, and an overal media witchhunt against the left in general, including Peter Tatchell.

with closures threatened, but none actually announced, wages were the immediate issue before most miners. It is for this reason it was wrong to put everything into winning the vote by throwing in the question of pit closures.

Drift Once the ballot on the combined issues had been lnot tha Real Danad ush, 'kilt wai Duard was encouraged to step up the offensive on jobs. Yet the NUM leadership, far from intensifying its efforts to educate the membership on the growing danger to jobs, allowed matters to drift.

Fi.si The wealth of information they have assembled on the scale of the NCB attack on manning levels and "uneconomic" pits was not made accessible to the members.

Worse, the struggle against closure at Kinneil was sabotaged by the Communist Party-led Scottish area leadership, who left it up to the militants at rank and file level to fight for the spreading of the action, and when this ran into difficulties, moved in to declare the struggle defeated.

This criminal role played by McGahey and his comrades weakened the fight Dy tne weish miners: tney hoodlan Illalala asi were forced to take action in the wake of a wellpublicised sell-out, while it was clear that the right wing would not fight and important elements of the left were scared.

But the Lewis Merthyr strike triggered action Carolenot byy altas tharrrhaest wales and began to spread. spritino strike doricinna in most areas. Scargil at first insisted - correctly - that a ballot was not needed, and appeared to be giving clear, decisive leadership.

The very next day, in the face of a press campaign, scargu swinea nis posttion and declared for a ballot. This move was catastrophic. By killing the strike wave stone dead, and conceding everything to the right wing, it ended any chance of winning the vote.

Miners, already faced by a determined, hostile goverment, huge coal stocks and a situation of high unemployment, needed determined leadership, who they could rely upon to stand firm.

But instead the left -mouthing meaningless phrases about 'unity" backed down in the face of a press witch-hunt and dealt a body-blow to NUM militants.

Trotsky. describes precisely this kind of betrayal in his book 'Where is Britain Going?' , when writing about reformist trade union leaders in Britain, he points out that they are guided by bourgeois 'public opinion' A brief period in the NUM has therefore exposed the limitations of the most left wing of the reformist leaders, as well as the Communist Party.

But the lessons John Mellroy draws are not in relation to the leadership of the class, but the consciousness of the rank and file!

Victimised

A second example he cites is that of the victimisation of Alan Thorett in BL's Cowley Assembly Plant:

'When, for example, Alan Thornett was victimisea in 1914, the manoeuvr- I AM 1 11 ing of the union apparatus was, if anything, far more of a problem than in 1982. Workers will always have to face such manoeuvring. The point is that at one time they overcome it, at another they don't.

"Overall at the moment, the bureaucrats who don't want a fight take the workers with them against the militants who do."

This ridiculous example is used more than once. But again the background to the events proves the opposite of Mellroy's point.

In 1974, Alan Thornett was a recognised deputy senior steward, who chaired all factory meetings. The IGWU ended up supporting his struggle to defend his stewardship: Moss Evans then National Organiser - was involved in the negotiations.

But at the same time the TGWU bureaucrats intervened to remove Thornett and convenor Bob Fryer from the leadership of the plant, to break *up the powerful trade union structure in the plant, witch-hunt the left wing and instal a vicious right Bill Sirs wing convenor.

The results of this 1974 betrayal were reflected in the events of 1982. The two situations were completely different.

In 1982 Thornett, though repeatedly elected deputy senior steward in shop floor ballots, was consistently refused recognition by management. As a result he was largely isolated in his own section, and known to most workers largely through memories of past struggles and the continuing press witch-hunts.

From 1974-82 Cowley workers were betrayed on each wage review, to the point where their wages have aroppe dramatically in value, while speed-up was imposed with the collaboration of. national union officials.

When the second victimisation of Thornett took place, a particularly weakened workforce was called upon to engage in an indefinite strike to defend someone they knew only by slanted media coverage.

To cap it all, the union official concerned, having made not a single statement in defence of Thornett refused to attend the mass meeting to decide on action and the struggle was finished there and then.

The central problem was and is the leadership given, not the rank and file. It is certainly true that betrayals - as in this instance - can have a cumulative effect on workers' attitudes over years. But the problem remains one not of consciousness of the rank and file but of leadership.

In BL in 1981 the prospect of all-out strike action brought a massive response from the most apparently conservative plants: Or we could look at the steel strike, There had been repeated and colossal betrayals of the steelworkers between 1926 and 1980: but when a firm, decisive strike call (not a national ballot!) was given, the response was 100%.

Stewards

Another ridiculous example used by Mellroy is of the stewards at Vauxhalls Ellesmere Port, who said that their members would only struggle over imports, not on wages.

Not only have these workers just rejected the call for import controls, but it was plain from the outset that it was the stewards who wanted an easy way out. Their diversion on imports was a follow-on from their one-day strikes over wages. They never even tested a serious call for all-out strike action.

It is, of course, possible that this would have been rejected: but to use the timidity of a group of stewards as an example of the retreat of the working class is to stand things on their head.

Continued next week

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