EScortitish TUC ola, dull and uninspiring
Socialist Organiser1983 1983-04-28Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 14 →
Read from the scan by machine and not corrected: expect misread words, and now and then a caption or a line from a neighbouring story. For anything you quote, read the scan.
Scan page 14
Join LABOUR AGAINST THE WITCHHUN"
Membership open to Constituency Labour Parties, trade union organisations, Labour Fee: CLPs and unions £10, wards £5, individuals and other organisations £3. Write toLAW, 11 Wilderton Road, London N16. .. New issue out now!
CLASS FIGHTER Get 10p per copy plus postage from 13 Buxton Rd. N19. schools and colleges and no prizes for guessing what the over-riding class composition of the respective institutions will be!
Finally, no doubt, we will see yet further increases in fees for overseas students, privatisation of ancillary services in education (such as catering) and increasing interference in course content from central government as institutions are more closely scrutinised: in terms of student union financing, we can expect at the least further cuts in funds, and at the worst, voluntary membership and/or far tighter government or institutional control.
We can't afford to let the Tories back in if we want to retain even the current State educaton service, let alone the expanded one that is needed.
by Stan THE Scottish TUC's 82nd annual congress was held at Rothesay on April 18-22. Stan Crooke reports.
Rothesay in late April is rather like the congress itself: cold, dull, uninspiring, and predominantly inhabited by senior citizens who have long since retired from active life.
The congress was really nothing but a re-run of this year's Labour Party Scottish conference: with a general election likely in the immediate future, the word "unity" provoked a response among delegates similar to that. produced whenever Lesley Crowther used to shout "Crackerjack!" in the show of the same name.
The only fundamental difference was the strong influence of the Communist Party on the STUC which revealed itself particularly in relation to international issues.
Major victim of the bureaucracy's unity offensive was a composite motion calling for opposition to "any discussions on wage restraints, whether statutory, voluntary or through a nationa economic assessment."
The same, day that Helen Liddell, Scottish secretary of the Labour Party, addressed the congress and called for support for a national economic assessment, this composite was rewritten to delete all reference to the national economic assessment.
The only opposition deletion from the composite of reference to the national economic assessment came from right Crooke wingers in the AUEW delegation. They wanted the phrase retained since they equated the national economic assessment with the beginnings of socialist corporatist planning.
ASTMS General Secretary Clive Jenkins drew up an emergency resolution, which he got the STUC General. Council to move, pledging full support for "Partners in Rebuilding Britain" - the Labour Party document which contains plans for a national economic assessment.
An apparently unending series of resolutions was passed, opposing all things evil and supporting all things good.
Unemployment, sexual and racist discrimination, anti-union legislation, nuclear weapons, low pay, long working hours, cuts in public spending, privatisation of council services, hiving off of nationalised industries, the Tory government in • general and Margaret Thatcher in particular were all condemned.
Unfortunately, all the resolutions were singularly lacking in any proposals for action.
The French and the Japanese were blamed for the plight of the Timex workers in Dundee. South Koreans and the Taiwanese were to blame for the threat to jobs in Scottish shipbuilding. Various European and third world countries were responsible for the crisis in the Scottish steel industry.
And so it went on. Time and time again, the reactionary demands for import controls and a ban on the export of capital were put forward as a 'solution' Working class mobilisation was SCHOOL caretakers and cleaning staff in Ealing, west London, have been on official strike since Monday 25th.
The strike has been called by the GMBU and NUPE against council moves to cut agreed staffing; levels. At some schools NUT anc. NALGO members have supported the strikers and refused to cross picket lines, so that the schools have been closed.
The council is likely to retaiiate by trying to bring in contract AGAINST THE Party affiliates, and individuals.
Scan page 15
Socialist Örganiser no.129 April 28 1983 Page 15
----- pull-quotes -----
never even seriously suggested. SCHOOL STRIKE