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of whether such a government will move to act in the interests of the working class, or whether it will move to control and discipline that class in the interests of capital.

A government which tries to make the existing system work in conditions where profits, the engine of that system, are in collapse has no alternative but to cut wages. It was the incomes policy issue more than any other which dug the grave of the '74'79 Labour government. That experience is rich in lessons for those of us today who argue that we must vote Labour but prepare to fight...

The Labour government came to power in March 1974 through the direct action of the miners in bringing down Edward Heath. Other groups of workers in emulation of their militancy moved into the breach. By November average earnings were 26% higher than a year previously.

The postal workers won a 24% increase, the power workers 31%, civil servants 32%, gas workers 34%. Average earnings were increasing at twice the rate of retail prices.

The minority government, knowing it owed its existence to militancy, could not act before another election. The employers were pushed onto the defensive.

The Manifesto itself had supported free collective bargaining. It specifically rejected the authoritarian and bureaucratic system of wage control imposed by the Heath government' • However, its exact wording like that of today's Economic Assessment carried within it the seeds of wage control. "The social contract is not concerned even primarily with wages. It covers the whole range of national policies. The unions in response confirm how they will seek to exercise the newiy restored right of free collective bargaining.

'Naturally the trade unions see their clearest loyalty to their own members. But the social contract is their free acknowledgement that they have other loyalties to the members of other unions too, to pensioners, to Programme, 30p; Wagi price and profit, 40p;

Communist Manifesto 60p; Capital volume 1 £3.95. Available c/o Socialist Organiser, 28 Middle Lane, London N8:

add money for postage. IN "Mini wages" - that's what the Socia the lowest paid, to invalids (!!), to the community as a whole' This represented the thinking of the leadership of the TUC General Counci newly crystallised around Len Murray and Jack Jones. They saw the advent of the Labour government as heralding not an onslaught on the capitalist system, but as providing once and for all guarantees of their role within that system.

Frightened by the instability that the 1968-74 militancy they had failed to control had created, and, fearing confrontation with the state, they were determined to integrate themselves into the state. Wage control was an essential part of this process.

What they felt was vital was that it should not be imposed directly by the state but through their own good offices. That was their job, the job Heath had cheated them out of - acting as brokers between capital and Four weeks after the first 1974 election, Jones was opining "The social contract does not mean control of wages but it does mean a realistic approach.' Contract meant By June the General Council were telling the membership what a realistic approach meant. Its statement Collective Bargaining and the Social Contract, formulated prior to any decision making within their unions by the tops, many of whom were acting in violation of Conference decisions, instructed negotiators to recognise that 'the scope for real increases in consumption is limited'.

Their objective should be to simply see that 'real incomes are maintained'. The document also insisted on a 12 month interval between major increases.

We were already some way from free collective bargaining. By the TUC Congress in September miners leader Laurence Daly was publicly urging 'some form of incomes policy' Murray was pontificating 'Do not confuse the sort of wage restraint we are asking unions to accept temporarily with the sort of restraint governments tried to impose on unions in previous periods: The purpose is different and the policy context is different' Some failed appreciate cuen e silone daineaonı AS Kel Gill acidly commented, It appears we are saying that we hate restraint under Heath but Arruments for HARD

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BOOKS Critique of the Gotha

by MARX ON I E

OCIAL CONTRACI SOCIAL

ASH MAL