All out behind N GA!

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Published by the Socialist Organiser Alliance, 28 Middle Lane London N8. Printed by Fast Fnd Offset L.td., I.ondon E2.

Self defence is no offence - defend the Newham 8!

Mass lobby outside the Old Bailey next Monday December 5, from 9am.

The picket, by now cordoned off away from the route of the van, continued a running battle with the police for two hours.

We might have stopped the vans leaving if there had been might have been in the thee there which there inlant ave hadn't stopped coach loads of pickets on the M62.

And the pickets would have been better stewarded if the police had not smashed up the NGA van with the megaphone in it and sealed it off on the instructions of the Chief Constable of Cheshire.

The poor stewarding left the initiative with the police, who were repeatedly given time to regroup and carry out their presumably pre-arranged tactics like reversing at full-spced along a crowded road and smashing un cameras and ramaramon From front page The TUC must mobilise the entire labour movement to go on tion.

the offensive to rip up Tory anti-union legation. It should call a one-day general strike immediately, in preparation for a full-scale general strike if the anti-union laws unworkable.

government does not back down and abandon its attempts to legally hamstring the trade is nothing less than treason to the labour movement.

Instead the TUC drags its feet. neither dead nor dying despite the The decision of the Employment Committee of the TUC to recommend to the General ment, and some within it. Council support for the NGA so long as it remains within the law is timid, fearful, cowardly and in ves of strength. the circumstances grossly inadequate. TUC leaders. If they lead even a It shows no fight. No guts. timid movement good. Insofar No proper sense of urgency. It as inev lena ronow cuse mem as is pusillanimous even by the far as you can. But at the end of TUC's own standards in such he day, the rank and file of the matters. umons can omy rev •i ourserves unespecially in alyo and deat For there is no way we can fight the Tory anti-union laws question for the labour moveand stay within those very same ment like the defence of the laws. NGA.

The Tories have a big, inflated, unrepresentative but stable majority in Parliament. Our decisive strength is outside Parliament.

The decisive strength we can throw into the scales - mass industrial action for political purposes and in solidarity with other workers who take on the Tory government - is now illegal.

The labour movement is thus faced with the choice: to fight or put its hands up in surrender. The TUC knows that and in its own shuttling, shambling way tries to avoid a choice.

The NGA knows it facing up to it.

The militant rank and file must insist that the entire labour movement faces up to it and chooses to fight for the rights of are to mean anything. the labour movement.

Neil Kinnock and Shadow Employment Secretary John Smith should stop talking out of both sides of their mouths and support the rights of the NGA , instead of prattling about our Chelmsford 33% Hull duty to 'obey the decisions of the courts' The basic rule for the labour movement is movement is this. no law that should be obeyed if we are strong from many industries and from all enough to resist it. All such laws over Britain have been on mass are vile and unjust class legisla- picket duty at Warrington -organise solidarity action.

The labour movement has Shah is getting supplies. Apply the right to go all-out to resist effective blacking to stop him. them and to make them unwork- producing. able, as we made Edward Heath's The logic of backing the NGA is - as the TUC well knows - full To preach the message that scale confrontation by the labour we have a duty to obey such laws movement against the Government, which culminates logically in a general strike.

The labour movement is If the only alternative to such La confrontation is surrender, then whimperings of faint hearts on militants throughout the labour the fringes of the labour move- movement will face up to their responsibilities. Even a defeated The organised labour move- general strike would do less damment still has tremendous reser- age in the long run to the labour movement than would a peaceful But we cannot rely on the surrender of our rights.

But we could win strike.

London Labour Briefing has called a meeting next Monday, December 5, 7pm at the House of Commons (room booked in The NGA needs immediate NGA.

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the name of Jeremy Corbyn), to discuss what Labour Party members can do to support the