Scott Lithgow needs action, not pleading!

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WITH the resumption of work after the New Year break at the threatened Scott Lithgow shipyards on the Lower Clyde, the 'campaign to keep it open has now started rolling - in the wrong direction.

The immediate threat to Scott Lithgow's future arises from Britoil's decision to cancel its contract for an offshore oil rig. If implemented, this decision would cost the jobs of all 4,500 workers at the yard. But even if Britoil overturns its decision, the yard's future looks bleak, since there is nothing on its order books.

Despite its reputation, the yard does not have a militant tradition. Even now, with the yard's future hanging in the balance, there is little sign of an active opposition emerging. The reaction to the leadership of the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions calling off the national shipyard strike due to begin on January 6 was muted.

Perhaps even more serious is the decision of the convenor (Duncan McNeil) and the shop stewards committee at the yard ban valial mo deter.

involving a major delerioration in working conditions at the yard le.g. abolition of job demarcation; introduction of three-shift working and thereby effective abolition of overtime). By doing so, they hope that British Shipbuilders will agree to renegotiate the contract with Britoil.

Duncan McNeil is prepared to go even further and has pledged readiness to agree to even more drastic changes if necessary "to improve the yard's competitiveness". • As one worker at Scott Lithgow put it: 'He must have got a pen tor Christmas. He wants to sign everything he can."

The shop stewards committee has failed to draw the workers in the yard into a campaign against THE LAND Rover pay strike, due to start on Friday 13th, was called off after mass meetings at the 11 plants voted narrowly to accept a marg. inally 'improved' offer from the company.

Once again, a major pay battle in BL has been effectively sabotaged by the national union officials, who place considerations of commercial viability above the living standards of their members. Instead of preparing for action on the basis of the previous two-to-one vote for a strike, officials like TGWU national automotive officer Grenville Hawley continued negotiations right up to the last minute, desperate to clutch at any straw which might give them an excuse for recommending acceptance.

In fact the 'improved' offer is no real improvement at all - and in some, respects Land Rover workers are worse off than they were before.

The claim was for £12 on the basic rate plus £7.50 bonus conOrganiset D badges 25p each, !I ten.. On January 17 British Shipbuilders announced 800 immediate redundancies at Scott Lithgow, with 2200 more to go March. Union leader Jim Murray's fighting response was: "It seems clear that the closure is inevitable". . Stan Crooke reports from Clydeside on the background closure. There has been no mass meeting since before Christmas, not even to ask for a mandate to agree to the "survival plan"

No bulletins or leaflets have been produced to counter management propaganda. Nor has there been any appeal for support to Cammell Lairds on Merseyside, although the two yards are being played off against each other, since both are engaged in offshore oilrig work.

And voluntary redundancies are still occurring, without any effective opposition. The yard's future is in grave doubt and there is no sign of efective opposition from the unions. Some workers are, hardly surprisingly, deciding that the lesser evil is to take redundancy.

The campaign now in pro. gress to save the yard involves a variety of figures of some distinction appealing to a variety of other figures of equal distinetion to do something to stop the yard being shut down.

The response from all these talks and concessions so far has been nil. Even when the shop stewards agreed to accept the "survival plan", , British Shipbuilders still claimed that nothing could be done to renegotiate the Britoil contract. And whilst local Tories and industrialists are scampering around like headless chickens at the thought of Scott Lithgow closing, their English counterparts, clearly made of sterner stuff, solidation. The company's first offer amounted to just 3% in 'new money' , the rest of it being bonus consolidation. This was rejected at my ma me it hear that they come not prepared to shift their position on new money.

The £2.35 'improvement' was tied to a cut in rest allowance of 40 minutes per week!

Inevitably the wheeling and dealing of the officials sapped militancy and confidence among the worktorce, especially as a meeting of senior stewards voted to back up the officials' recommendation.

Even So, the final vote was close: 3,967 to 3,227. The decisive vote was at the second largest plant, the Sherpa factory at Common Lane, Birmingham. They had rejected the offer first time round, but were swung to acceptance at the second meeting.

The largest plant, Solihull, voted to reject, as they had done A strike would have faced immediate problems of the division between Solihull and Common Lane on the one hand, and the nine smaller plants on the other.

The smaller plants face closure under Land Rover's 'rationalisation' plans, and most of them voted against action in the first round of mass meetings.

But firm leadership from the officials and senior stewards, plus delegations going out from Solihull and Common Lane to the small plants, could have overcome this problem.

The sell-out of the pay claim is undoubtedly a setback to the chances of stopping the closures, show no signs of remorse.

Up till now, the workers at the yard have been allotted the role of passive spectators both by the shop stewards committee and also by the STUC and national union leaderships.

The latter's strategy is not to mobilise workers but to make as many concessions as possible. If they concede everything, then the yard might just remain open, at least for the time being, and with a reduced workforce having to work under a particularly strict labour discipline.

An alternative outcome can be achieved only by an alternative strategy. This means drawing the workers themselves into the centre of the struggle, winning the propaganda war, and organising for occupation of the yard, keeping the three orders now being worked on at Scott Lithgow as "hostages" until the yard's future is guaranteed.

And, above all, it means appealing for solidarity action from other yards, linking up the fight for the survival of Scott Lithgow with a national camnegotiated between British Shipbuilders and the Confed leadership at national level.

CORRECTION.

In last week's Socialist Organiser (number 161) an article on the Carousel dispute in Glasgow stated that 'the Socialist Workers Party (who) argue that the strike has already been lost and to pressurise the Regional Committee to pay the fines" This is a misprint and should have read: 'the Socialist Workers Party argue that... to pressurise the Regional Committee is a waste of time. but militants at Solihull and Common Lane must argue for solidarity with the threatened plants and refuse to accept transferred work.

amd-garys LESBIANS and gay men employed by Manchester City Council will now enjoy greater job protection because of recent Council decision. At its meeting on Wednesday 4 January the Council agreed to include "no discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation or disability" to its existing equal opportunities programme which already covers women and ethnic minorities.

The Labour Campaign for Gay Rights has been campaigning locally for this policy for the last two years and the successful amendment was an initiative from local government union NALGO who have an excellent policy on gay rights. The proposal was discussed in detail at December's Personnel Committee, with the Tories opposing the inclusion of both sexual orientation and disability. Audrey Greaves, Liberal Councillor for Levenshulme, opposed including sexual orientation despite the fact that support for this is national Liberal policy.

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Paper of the Socialist Organiser Alliance No. 162 January 19 1984 25p Ciaimants and strikers 10p