NIRC vS AUEW The National Industrial Relations Court has fined the Engineering Union for refusing to re-admit a member who scabbed on his fellow workers during a strike. If the union fails to pay the fine, its funds will most probably be seized. If it pays the fine but refuses to re-instate the scab, then it will simply be fined again. Mr. Scanion's policy of 'neither war nor peace' with the NIRC is being put to the test.
At the TUC Conference, the AUEW proposed that unions should refuse to attend the court under any conditions and that a TUC fund should be established to pay the fines of unions under attack. Seanlon may be tenpted to argue now that the union could have fought the fine if only his resolution had been passed and the TUC fund had been established. When the T&GWU was fined in the Heaton's case last summer Jack Jones used exactly the same argument of lack of TUC backing to just ify his capitulation to the court.
The issue is quite elementary. The working class knows only too well what to do with scabs: you get rid of them... by the easiest ind swiftest means. If persuasion does not work. then force becomes necessary. And when the scab brings in friends to assist then you have to deal with his friends sal firmness. But for the trade unio bureaucracy, this case, when the scab's friend is a state institution, becomes apparently impossible to deal with. The Court's chief, Sir John Donaldson, tries to preseat himself as a man in the speech on the case he deed that "the referee's decision is seldom lar with both sides". This is a dangerous analogy for Donaldson to make. He may consider that the workers' struggle against the capitalists for a decent standard of living is a game, but it is a pretty nightmansh one when the employing class is able to make up the rules through Parliament as the game goes on; where the employing class chooses the referee", and where that referee insists that a worker who has been trying to throw the game by scabbing cannot be thrown out of the team! The AUEW leadership has declared its desire to smash the Industrial Relations Act and the NIRC. The great mass of trade unionists have already shown their readiness to struggle on this issue in the repeated stoppages against it before it became law and in the great struggle to free the five dockers imprisoned by the NIRC. The issue in this case is equally clear cut: by lining up with scabs the NIRC has again revealed its true purpose and has thrown down a challenge to the entire trade union movement. The AUEW leadership has had at least three The TUC has denounced the Government's pay freeze and refused further talks on incomes policy while the freeze is on. With this action, Victor Feather has noisily slammed the stable door just two days after the horse has bolted.
H e and his friends on the General Council no doubt hope to regain some credibility within the trade union movement by this show of opposition. But the fact is that the single most important factor opening the door to any form of wage restraint was the TUC leadership.
In the Government's darkest hour after the freeing of the five dockers, it was Mr Feather who came forward to offer the hand of friendship, and begin a three month publicity campaign for an incomes policy. Without Feather's support the Government would not have been able to carry off its massive public relations exercise. This must not be forgotten in the months ahead when the General Council proclaims its opposition to the present freeze. SHREWD The effects of the TUC's policy on working class living standards were felt even before the freeze was introduced. Terrified at the prospect of having to stand-up to the Goverment or lose the support of their membership, the trade union bosses fell over each other in their rush to settle before the freeze became law.
Faced with claims outstanding from more than a million workers, the Government's tactics were quite shrewd. They first put a brake on all public sector negotiations, getting their lieutenants in the nationalised industries to say that nothing could be agreed until the pay talks between the Tories By GERY LAWLESS Mr Heath and Mr Feather in relaxed mood after the introduction of the pay freeze the CBl and the TUC had been concluded. Then when the Government came out with its proposal of a f2 limit, this was declared to he the ceiling by the management negotiators. Outery appropriately followed from the trade union side. Then, at the "last minute, before a total freeze was slapped on, the Government allowed its lieutenants to settle wage claims at levels slightly above the previously proposed £2 limit. The union bosses leapt at the offers with enthusiasm, seeing that they could tell their memberships that they had won more than the original government limit by settling before the total freeze stopped them getting anything! The resulting picture is very much below what even the TUC considered to be the suitable limit for wage increases (£3.50): ASTMS University Technicians £2.71 Electricity supply workers.. £2.65 Local government workers £2.40 Government industrial workers..... £2.60 The government is praying that the working with a real living crisis, different methods class will spare it another version of last year's miners' strike. A repeat performance of that victorious upsurge would break the last vestige of Heath's credibility, as the Financial Times made clear the other day. It pointed out that "Ministers are making such frantic efforts to create a climate of opinion in which an incomes policy will have a chance of holding because the government will not have a chance of winning another election unless it achieves it." And after explaining that the government did not feel strong enough to esist a determined challenge from the working class, the paper concluded that "a real crisis of nerve is in progress." At present the government's one chance lies in the union leaders' refusal to fight. THE FRONT LINE With the leaders of the strong sections of the working class running for cover, the full weight of the struggle against the pay freeze is at present falling on 250,000 hospital workers. The hospital ancillary workers are amongst the lowest paid in the country. They lie 127th out of 129 in the national