Leaders crack Body Plant

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ON MAY 13, the National Coal Board announced its intention of closing the Cardowan Colliery in Lanarkshire, at an immediate cost of 1000 jobs.

The NCB says the pit lacks resources; suffers from poor environmental conditions underground; and is running at a loss.

The NUM estimates that there are still enough reserves to guarantee work for the next AS the 350 workers at Greenings Engineering factory in Warrington enter their fifteenth week Onl strike against redundancies, the action has been stepped up by an occupation of the offices and the twenty years.

Conditions underground at Cardowan are no worse than at any other pit. In fact, the dust conditions in some of the pits to which the miners are supposed to be transferred are worse.

It is clear however that Cardowan is unprofitable. The NCB claims that it loses £30 on every ton of coal mined there. According to last week's report of the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, production costs per tonne of coal at Cardowan are £69.9, as against a nationai average of 230.b.

Initially the NCB attempted to shut half the pit within a week, and the other half within a month. This plan came to nothing when the unions appealed to the review procedure, which will probably be a protracted affair.

Then the NCB offered transfers to other cóllieries without giving any notice of this to the NUM, and at a time when the local union officers were absent closure of the VS2 face, given its potentially dangerous condition, but was not prepared to sanction the removal of equipment from the pit as a whole.

A successful campaign against the closure of Cardowan can be mounted, though the problems involved in this should not be ignored or underestimated But winning supporting strike action from miners outside of Cardowan, whose pits are next for the chop, and a propaganda campaign to prevent miners at Cardowan taking up the NCB's offer of lump sum payments for voluntary redundancies, are clearly two crucial aspects.

Cardowan is the first pit due for closure since the general election, and it can prove to be a make-or-break case. If the NCB close it, then the road is obviously clear for a lot more closures, both in Scotland and elsewhere.

Harry AS BL Cowley management attempt to undermine the militant defence of working conditions by the workforce in the Body and Assembly Plants, they have been given a vital boost by the right wing Body Plant leadership.

Shop floor workers had been rejecting management offers of a £9 increase in bonus, and threats of disciplinary action, and clocking out three minutes before the end of each shift to take their 'washing up time' • Company moves to dock 15 minutes wages each time this occurred were met by workers clocking out 15 minutes early!

Recognising the leadership as the weak link, management then announced that washing-up time would be abolished at the end of the last week. A mass meeting was called - at which loud-mouthed TGWU District Secretary David Buckle was conspicuously absent, and convenor Bill Roche conveniently out of town.

Deputy convenor Morton gave a speech which effectively put management's case, warning of loss of bonus and took a vote without any recommendation as to action. Despite this, a clear majority voted for rejection of the company ultimatum. Morton's attempts to declare an even vote and split the meeting failed to dispel the majority -and in desperation he called for an immediate ballot, again with no recommendation.

Despite the in-built advantage such a ballot gives to the right wing over mass meetings, a 2,700 vote produced a majority of less than 400 for acceptance - showing that with any amount of positive leadership the shop floor would have solidly backed a policy of defiance.

This sabotage of the Body Plant resistance leaves the nearby Assembly Plant workforce isolated in its defence of washingup time, which produced a fourweek strike last April.

Assembly Plant management have promptly reapproached the Plant Level Committee with new offers and pressure for them to ape Morton in holding a mass meeting with no. recommendation.

This has proved unsuccessful, and the company is reluctant to provoke renewed strike action in the sensitive sales run-up to the new August registrations.

But a leaflet put out by the company on. Monday suggests that a renewed attempt at implementation is imminent.

Stewards - who are meeting as we go to press - must remain on their guard in defence of hard-won working conditions. DESPITE their convurase l 'suicide' verdict on Coli Roach, the jurors at the inquest still felt enough 'deep distress' at the police handling of the case to write to Home Secretary Leon Brittan about it.

The police, they say, were neither sympathetic nor diligent enough in their handling of the case. Which is hardly surprising given Stoke Newington police's record over cases like those of the White family (who received $51,000 compensation alter being attacked by these cops) and Michael Ferreira, who bled to death without medical attention inside the police station.

Leon Brittan, however, thinks a public inquiry into Colin Roach's death would be neither 'desirable' nor 'necessary'. He would like to see 'those concerned sit down and consider carefully and responsibly how the problems of the area can be tackled'.

ONE THIRD of the workforce in the textile industry is Asian, and it is Asians who have suffered most from the dramatic decline in the industry (the workforce declined from over 80,000 in 1970 to 22,000 by 1980).

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-RACISM- Roach