The preparations for the May Day General Strike are taking place in the teeth of opposition, if not outright sabotage from the trade union leaders.
So far the AUEW and the TGWU have out against the strike call. As for Mr. Gormley of the NUM, he cynically tried to use the result of the miners' ballot to declare that the miners could not be expected to come out on May Day.
RANK AND FILE ACTION But in many areas the retreats by national leaderships are being counter-acted by local rank and file initiatives. In Oxford, for example, the Trades Council is to convene a meeting of all shop-stewards and work-place representatives of all unions in the area to plan and co-ordinate the May Day strike. Such an example can be followed in other areas to decisively rebuff the strike breaking of Gormley and his friends. In areas where no central coordinating body exists, and in those localities where right-wing domination of the Trades Councils ensures no action will be organised, Action Committees should be established now to mobilise for 1 May.
In addition plans are being laid to ensure that May Day involves much more than a protest march and meeting. In some areas Trades Councils are electing a committee to organise a mobile picket force to ensure a total shut down and suggestions have been put forward for public transport to be commandeered by the strikers to facilitate mass attendance at meetings and demonstrations. In this way the strike can be transformed into a massive demonstration of the potential power of the working class movement.
POLITICAL STRIKE The Labour Party Executive has decided to back the TUC's May Day call, but simultaneously made itself appear ridiculous by declaring that May Day would not be a political strike! What is it then? A religious ceremony? All but the blind know that May Day is a strike against the Government. But it will take place at a time when the trade union and Labour leaderships are trying to run away from the fight to bring down the Tory Government. If the TUC had prepared and organised a united working class offensive to smash the Pay Laws during the winter then May Day would have marked a climax of the labour movement's fight. As it is. the hospital workers are being left to fight alone.
The TUC is preparing to return to talks with the Government. As Scanion put it: "we must face First: the struggle against Phase Two has so far failed. But not because of too much militancy. The real reason is the refusal of the labour leadership to organise a united struggle against the Government.
Second: the last three years show that without militant, bold action nothing whatever can be won.
Third: a policy of pleading for mercy at the negotiating table has been shown to be absolutely futile. The Tory Government must press forward its attack until the working class is decisively defeated: nothing else will solve the crisis of British capitalism and enable the exploitation of the working class to be jacked up sufficiently to restore the rate of profit. In these conditions the "realism" of Scanlon is nothing but a policy for working class defeat. The only realistic policy for the labour movement today is that of preparing for a General Strike to throw out the Tory Government. Every issue, every struggle must be tackled. with that need in mind.
Following the miners" ballot the Tories have won a temporary breathing space. They will Sheffield demonstration in support of hospital workers showed way forward to united working class offensive try to press home this advantage during the coming months before the next wave of working class struggle on the economic front. The propaganda war against trade unionists will be stepped up. There will be a stepping up of the repression which is already occurring against hospital pickets and the building workers from Shrewsbury.
May Day should mark the start of a working class counter-offensive. These moves from the capitalist class must be taken up by militants and a fight must be waged for the working class movement to be able to answer them. A halt must be called to the retreats of the trade union bureaucracy: there should be no talks with the Government; nothing less than the total scrapping of the Industrial Relations Act and the wage controls is acceptable. The unions must organise defence of picket lines and every court attack on militants must be treated as an attack on the whole working class movement.
Every strike for higher pay must be treated as a struggle to be supported by the entire labour movement. And every struggle must be approached within the strategy of a General Strike to bring down the Government.
London Conference Against the Wage Freeze and Against the Government SATURDAY 14th APRIL 1973 11 a.m.
CENTRAL HALL. WESTMINSTER
allowances
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called their members out; but the NUR, the NUT and other executives have come