On Monday 15th June, the cleaners at Lancaster University began a series of token strikes for one hour daily, picketing the administration building and leading demonstrations of students around the university. Previously a very passive, disorganised section of university workers, the cleaners have taken such a militant stand after constant procrastination by the administration in the consideration of their demand for free adequate transport. The university has tried to maintain a reputation of being a liberal institution and a model employer, however, the political work of the Socialist Woman Group has shown the relations between the university and its employees are extremely bad. Not only the day cleaners but also the male night cleaners, the catering staff and the porters have recently expressed discontent over their conditions. This disatisfaction found expression in the university newsletter Scan, in the local press and, particularly in the cases of catering staff and day cleaners, through the Lancaster Socialist Woman Group.
In December 1970, the Socialist Woman Group, compiling information for a pamphlet on working women in Lancaster, began to talk. to the cleaners about their working conditions. From these talks it soon became apparent that the cleaners held a common dissatisfaction with the transport arrangements. The university bus service is provided purely for the benefit of the students, and while the university workers are allowed to use it, this means that there is no transport during the vacations. Their complaint is a justifiable one in view of the fact that the university was built three miles from the town itself, on the top of a steep hill. Consequently, the staff are forced to use the BurnleyLancaster bus service, which is invariably full because of day-trippers to and from Morecambe. Apart from these inconveniences, the staff were left to walk the final halfmile up the hill. However, underlying all these questions was that of the cost. The cleaners have to pay between 10%-20% of their wages in fares, all the year round, with fares being higher during vacations on the Burnley-Lancaster service.
LUNCH HOUR MEETINGS The Socialist Woman Group arranged meetings of the day cleaners once a week during their lunch hours. Thus the cleaners not only formed a very good relationship with the Group and through them with the student body, but-and more important-their self-confidence began to grow and they started to realise the benefits of uniting together to put forward their complaints. As has already been stated, the cleaners were previously very disorganised. Each cleaner is isolated in a particular college building, her only contact being with the supervisors who can therefore interpret the rules totally arbitrarily. The cleaners were in fact unsure even about the meagre rights afforded to them in the terms of their employment. For example, they were told by their supervisors that they were obliged to work any weekends if required; this was not in the terms of the contract, There was similarly confusion about tea-breaks. Once the cleaners were able to meet and discuss their working conditions, a number of grievances, headed by the transport problem, were listed. In this way the cleaners realised that it was not simply their individual work situation, but the whole system of relationships, which was at fault.
Further meetings, on occasions with militant trade unionists such as May Hobbs and Audrey Wise, led the cleaners to draw the further conclusion that it is necessary in any struggle against the management to gain the support of the trade union movement. Consequently Mrs. Lancaster was elected shop steward and 22 out of about 30 cleaners joined the T&G, which had already organised the night cleaners.
"THE LIBERAL UNIVERSITY"
For five years the university has refused to recognise the union's right to act in negotiations. The university admin. have, however, set up their own particular system of nego. tiation in order to bypass the union. This the Joint Consultative Committee, which is officially said "to promote the free flow of ideas between management and emplayees..." In fact it quite blatantly intimidates its employees, as can be sean in the interview below, and has only advisory status. At this meeting the Joint C.C. apparently arrived at a "decision"-although no vote was taker-against the provision of free transport for the cleaners. This was in March, and by mid-June, with the approach of the vacation and transport no nearer to being provided, the cleaners, backed by an emergency meeting of their T&G branch, decided on a series of taken strikes and pickets, Even this small action had immediate results: the university verbally recognised the union as the sole negotiating body for university workers.
Lancaster Socialist Woman Group has supported the the exploitative nature of the university, which, although it epitomises the bourgeois ideal of a "liberal" institution in its relationship with the students, has no scruples in exploiting the problems caused by the extremely high unemployment in this area. Thus the university workers are in a very vulnerable position, and support from the student body was absolutely essential to prevent victimisation of these 22 isolated cleaners. On Wednesday 17th June, after a great deal of propagandising, the Socialist Woman Group proposed in a Federation (Students Union meeting that there should be an occupation of the university administration building until the cleaners' demands had been satisfactorily met. The university was effectively brought to a standstill and although the administration had previously refused to meet the cleaners until they stopped industrial action, by the end of the first day of occupation they were willing to do so provided of course that the students withdrew their solidarity action. Obviously both of these expedients-withdrawing student support or industrial action-would weaken the workers bargeining position. Therefore the mass meeting of the occupation, after hearing an address by May Hobbs of the London night cleaners, who called for their continued support, voted to remain in occupation, in spite of the threats of injunctions and victimisation of individual students, until the cleaners were satisfied in their demand.
The militancy of the cleaners and the unqualified solidarity action by the students combined to create a force which could not be broken by the repressive and underhand actions bf the university authorities-such as the naming of individual students in a court injunction and the calling of a "union" meeting by the management to which non-union cleaners and supervisors were specifically invited. Indeed, within a few days we were able to expose that the liberal veneer was simply a cover over the university's repressive core. We were also able to expose the role of the "Left"
bureaucrats of the NUS who hastened to sand up a representative to give "unqualified support" the hollowness of which was revealed when an appeal for legal aid, the following night, was in practice rejected and the students were told that they were "on their own".
However, the cleaners' morale was further boosted by the message of salidarity brought up to Lancaster by May Hobbs. The following interview with Mrs. Lancaster, shop steward of the day cleaners, and May Hobbs was conducted on Thursday, the fourth day of the token strikes and the second day of the solidarity student action:
C. Young: The administration have repeatedly said that your demands are not clear; is there any confusion about them?
A. Lancaster: No, it's quite simple; we want a bus to run between Garstang and the university and another between Morecambe and the university. -And would this be just for the 22 cleaners who had fought for it?
A. L: Well, it's us who's fighting for it, but if they want to carry on working and then to come in with us after well, that's up to them. We're not going to pressurise them. -Do you think your claim is justified and how confident ate you that you will win the fight?
AL: I know it's justifiable, I have to pay 32%p every day, that's 20% of my wages. The Burnley Lancaster bus that we have to use in the vacation is very unreliable-a few times we've had to wait from 3.30 until 5 o'clock for a bus that isn't full. Sometimes the girls who live in Galgate labout three miles away! have to walk. We're all quite confident that we'll get somewhere you have to be. I think we're so confident because it's been made into a big issue now, it's not just us and the management. We need the publicity. The students are getting most of the publicity but they're doing it on behalf of us. -What do you think of the students support? A.L. I just can't say enough for them; we wouldn't have got this far without them. Some people say that students don't really care about workers and that they're only messing about, but they've really been good for us. We would have tried to stick it out without them, but we would have been forced to back down in the end.
May Hobbs: It was the same in London, with the students and the Socialist Woman groups. They put such a lot of work into it.
A. L: Yes, they've been running about here for us, arranging meetings, writing leaflets and letters to the paper—we appre ciate it very much. -What do you think about the way you've been treated by the management?
didn't want any trouble but their pig-headedness forced us into it. Take the mini-bus, at the beginning of this fight we would have been satisfied with a mini-bus that ran up and down the university hill during the vacations—we were willing even to pay some of the cost. But they said it couldn't be done it's funny but the first day of our token strike a free mini-bus was running up and down that hill.
Now we've got more confidence in ourselves and we can stick together, we'ne determined to demand the best.
Before we started having meetings we used to be scared, just as some of the other university workers are now, When we complained to the Joint Consultative Committee about the conditions, one of them asked why we worked here. One of us, although we know now it was stupid, said it was because there were no other jobs. So the management officials said that if we didn't like the conditions we could leave. I said, "What, all of us? and he said, "Yes, all of you. We're more confident now and we realise that it's better not to make complaints on your own. Like, a couple of weeks ago, a girl who had to clean out a college all on her own went to see the administration, and she was again told if she didn't like it she could leave. Now if only she had come to me we could nave done it through the union ...
-Have the union officials been helpful in this campaign?
The administration claim that they have in fact confused your demands.
A. L: Well, at first they were a dead loss, we were getting nowhere, but lately they have been getting better.
M.H: If you push them, like you've done they have to, don't they?
A. L: Yes-well, we've been pushing Mr. Taylorson all the time. At the beginning they messed things up because two officials, him and Mr. Page, put in two different demandsalthough we were quite clear what we wanted. Of course the management wouldn't listen to us-they said that a letter had to come from an official, Mr. Page eventually withdrew completely leaving only Mr. Taylorson who kept stalling for a while, constantly asking us what we exactly wanted, although we'd made it quite clear we wanted the two free buses. I think he was hoping that if he asked long enough we'd back down. Anyway in future we're going into meeting with him. We're all going in tomorrow, We used to sit quiet in meetings but we've been pushed about so long that we're not frightened.
M.H: Yes, you've really got to make the unions for you. It's no good waiting for the officials to move while you just sit there paying in your dues.
A.L: Well, none of us have been involved in this sort of thing before -I just used to send in my money each week and didn't know what I was paying for.
The following day after this interview, with the strike and occupation still solid despite the intimidation by the authorities of the students and an attempt to manipulate a union meeting, the administration was forced to concede. Although the cleaners did not get their exact demand, ie. the two free buses, they agreed to what they considered to be an equivalent. Le. a travel allowance of 120p ja week. Under a written guarantee that this would form the basis of further negotiations between the cleaners and a management committee, and a written guarantee against victimisation, both the token strikes and the occupation THE ENOC Although the university authorities have, in fact, managed to avoid agreeing to the principle that they should provide transport for their staff lan admission which would have led to their being flooded by demands for transport from other sections of university workersi, one can still consider this campaign a victory for the cleaners and students. Not only have the cleaners gained self confidence in the face of the administration but they have also learnt that by rank-and-file organisation they can make the union and union officials work for them, This has encouraged other sections of university workers who have shown solidarity and are learning of the benefits of rank-and-file organisation.
The students, by forcing the Vice-Chancellor's hand making him react violently in a totally unconstitutional manner lover-riding the decisions of various committees and officials) have exposed the true nature of the university structure, alarming even the most conservative academics on the staff. Finally, by their solidarity, students and workers have managed to score a victory and have been seen to score that victory in a dramatic way against one of the institutions of bourgeois society.
of some support for the electoral road and does not identify with the FLN/FALN. It is in danger of being all things to all people and encompasses a broad membership from right and left of the old PCV. It claims a place as a Marxist party and has organised its own trade union, the CGT, but its commitment to revolutionary struggle is not dissimilar from the PCV. It is new and has yet to evolve. At the moment it Is a "better" PCV. But one Venezuelan comment was: when a piece of shit is divided in half, you get two pieces of shit.
The Caldera Christian Democrat regime, which defeated Accion Democratica in the 1969 elections, is the most "progressive" variant yet produced by imperialism, Nevertheless, it is in continual crisis and far from being able to abandon the weapon of repression. On taking office it introduced a programme of so-called Pacification, designed to incorporate revolutionaries into Venezuela's democratic way of life. It was a kind of semi-amnesty: if revolutionaries came down from the mountains they might not be gaoled, especially if they provided useful information to the repres sive apparatus. in fact, it was a manoeuvre to weaken the left and eat into its foroas. It was also designed so that revolutionaries came out into the open to be counted in preparation for the definitive clamping down of the repression. And, parallel to the Pacification, the shootings and arrests continue. More than 15 students and demonstrators have been killed in the two years of Christian Democrat Pacification and many more people have been indiscriminately arrested, sometimes merely for "investigation", often a euphemism for torture. There are some 200 political prisoners, The repression affects not only student demonstrations, but workers and above all, peasants. As Vea y Lea,