The Shrewsbury 6 have gained nothing from the recent general election except a new giol-keeper.
Militants in East Kent have decided to do something about this despicable betrayal of these victims of class justice. They are holding a Delegate Conference in Aylesharh on 20 April to discuss the way forward in the right to free the 6.
NUM SUPPORT
Launched from a meeting organised by the East Kent Shrewsbury Defence Committee, the Conference is receiving support from militants in the Kent NUM, UCATT, and Kent University Students Union. The Conference is being backed by Jack Collins, Kent Area delegate to the NUM Executive, and NUM militants are playing a leading role in its orgi nisation.
With the local NUM giving such a lead, the conference should receive good representation from local union branches, trades councis, and political organisations (all of whom are being contacted) and will be able to provide a focus for militants from the scattered building sites in the area This would make possible the establishment of a representative defence committee, and ensure that whatever action the Conference decides on will be fought for throughout the local labour movement.
POSITIVE LEAD
Clearly one of the first tasks of such a committee will be to educate trade unionists about the importance of this strugale. A speaking tour of local building sites would be a top priotity.
But this must be contred around some positive lead for carrying the campaign forward. One important move would be to turn the traditionsi May Day Rally, not simply into a protest demonstration on the Shrewsbury case, but into a one-day strike, This would show the growing determination of trade unionists to force the Labour Government into freeing the 6.
A conference of shop stewards committee delegates from the engineering industry met in Manchester on Friday to discuss the struggle for the engineers" pay claim.
This was a recall of the conference held in December, but the only firm decision taken was full support for the national ban on overtime due to begin next Monday.
With such an undramatic concoon one alant gave been contasca as to why the sponsors bothered to call the conference at all The answer to that is to be found in the speeches that they made, rather than the LOCISION DON'T RING US It was clearly intended that the message which should emerge from the conference was the need for further action should the overtime ban prove to be inadequate.
One speaker made it plain from the oulset that there must be no bolding back on the wages struggle merely because a Labour Government has been tetumed. "The best way to support the Goverament is through mass action on our wages and conditions clain."
Speakers from Sheffield continued this theme by denouncing the fact that Phase 3 has not been erased, There must be no watering down of Labour's election manifesto, and dampening down of the wages struggle."
After several "war-like" speeches of this nature, the delegates agreed that the sponsors reconvene the conference when necessary to review the progress of the overtime ban. Then they went Home.
RED-FACED CP
The main force behind the conference was the Communist Party. The CP has a very simple problem.
Collins is second from left].
If such a lead were to emerge from on a firm foundation and with a clear perspective for struggle. The the Conference-and if it received the backing of the NUM-It would strengthen the hand of militants in the bulding industry locally, and would set an example to the trade union movement on a national level.
It is necessary and urgent to start rebuilding the Shrewsbury movement It has told us time and again that the way to advance the interests of the working class is through constructing an alliance with left-wingers such as Jack Jones and Hugh Scanion.
It therefore becomes extremely embarassing for the CP when these "left-wingers" openly sell out the interests of the working class as Jones has already done by declaring his support for the social contract and agreeing to moderate wage All that has prevented Scanion from following the saite path so quickly is the pressure from militants in the engineering industry. This is why the CP called last Friday's conference.
A pay dispute at River Don Stampings in Sheffield could act us an important detonator in the strugge for the national engineering claim.
One hundred and fitty drop forge workers at the foundry have been locked out by the management for nearly three weeks, as a result of their decision to stop piecework in support of their claim, DETERMINED The workers are demanding a minimum of E45 for all stamp shop furnacemen and drivers, and E55 for all stampers, The lockout has made them determined not to go back until their demands are met.
The tining of this strupale is particularly significant. If the claim is won, it would plough through Phase Three and spur the struggle for the national claim. position to give a lead in the fight to free the Shrewsbury 6, East Kent Conference can be a 20th April-10.30-4:30 pm, Aylesham Working Men's Club (The Legion).
Credentials from: Snowdown NUM, Snowdown. Colliery, Kent, It was never intended to be a real springboard for launching mass action" over the claim. It was simply meant to be a message for Scanion:
us by selling out?
Nothing demonstrates more
sharply the complete bankruptcy of the CP's whole strategy. Red Weekly has been explaining for months that the rank-and-tile should place no reliance on Scanion & Co. Only infile itself can hope to win the claim in full.
have done precisely that, If it had been serious about launching mass However, the main preoccupation of the District Committee has been to attempt to get the men back to work, on the basis that they cannot smash Phase Three alone. The strike committee is resisting this pressure.
may be taken at Firth Derihon itself, where there is a strong pos sibility that the stamp shop will EXTEND STRUGGLE IMG member Richard Stojak; who is secretary of Firth Derihon shop stewards committee and was mectings, has puinted our that if the District Committee feels that the River Don workers cannot win alone, then it should he aiming to extend the struggle. Miners* 81% vote for strike action is announced to the NUM Executive last January. [Kont Area Delegate Jack The power and prestige of the miners, won in the fight against the Tory Government, puts them in the best FREE THE SHREWSBURY 6 or at the door.
East Kent delegate confererice on "Dear Hughie, please don't embarrass the industry.
INDEPENDENT INITIATIVES
afford. dependent initiatives by the rank-andThe Manchester conference could River Don.
An important step in this direction Into the battle.
invited ro attend the strike committee Tors. decisive first step in this direction boat'.
Delegate lee 50p. Open to observers. Open-to all trade unions, tradas councila, political organisaDons. National speakers.
Force Labour to free the 6.
Support the conference, action" in support of the claim, it should have called for a rutional cognecring strike and clected a nanom coordinating committee to campaien for this throughout But that would mean a direct conflict with High Scanion, and that is something the Communist Party connot afford. However, holding back the struggle in the interests of unity with Scanion is something which the working class cannot It is these two roads which now face militants in the engineering industry, The CP has made it clear which one it intends to take, TERRY CRAWFORD adopt a similar claim to that at CAMPAIGN The IMG contrade is also pushing Tor a cumpaign to be conducted by the strike committee throughout the engineering industry in Sheffield. The outcome of the struggle will lurgely depend on their ability to link it to the general confrontation witch u looming throughout the industry, and pall other factories TERRY CRAWFORD mant.
The River Don sikers are getting no dispure beneft ond need money agentil. Rush donations to:
George Bullock, Senior Steward, River Don Stampings, 7 Beacon Close, Grimerthorpe, Sheffield 9. that base, The Morning Star of 1 April accused the National Rank and File confer. ence organised by the International Socialists two weeks ago of trying to split the LCDTU. Unfortunately, the Communist Party hus little to worry about.
Although some live hundred delegates turned up to the conference, held in Birmingham, not many were from the commanding heights".
Of the 300 trade union bodies represented, only 15% were shop stewards committees, combine committers or district committees, The vast majority of the delegates came from union branches, more than one-third of them from white collar uniIn most cases those present were from IS's existing base in industry. Still, you may say, very impressive. IS does seem to have a big lever in certain parts of the workers movement. Just so, if it wasn't so difficult to figure out who was on which end of the lever!
The union bureaucrats are urging their members to stay cool and give Wilson his fifty ninth chance, lest the social compact prove to be written in disappearing ink, For a while many trade unionists will listen. But those who are stuck with miserable wage settlements, or are coming under attack in the factories, will not be so inclined to avoid rocking the Everybody at the Rank and File Conference wunted to fight the bureaucrats, the social compact, the Shrewsbury juilingt and Wilson. But there were few ideas offered on bow to go about carrying out these commendable tasks.
One resolution was put forward (by members of the Workers Fight group which tried to come to grips with some of these problems. It discussed how to win more permanent gains, how to overcome the polltical weaknesses of the trade union move ment, and how to move towards worken" control. But it was thrown out. Too advanced, too complicated said a shop steward from GEC Coventry. We must stick to 'minimal So stick the conference did. Its approach can be summed up an 'do more and better what you have always done. But it doesn't work: Two years Jater you have to do it all again. And in that time the ruling cluss has learned a few leasons and made preparations, even if the workers' movement hasn't, What steps does IS propose now that the conference is over? To get everyone to campaign on the confer ence resolution in their branches and to build the rank and file papers. But the resolution contained few practical steps. Nothing about the NALGO claim and London weighting allowance strugge, nothing about the fight for the engineering claim.
As one delegate pointed out, to say oppose all forms of racial sen doesn't tell you how to do it. Indeed. the National Union of Students' couference resolution on 'no platform for fascists' was a bigger step forward than anything decided at the Rank and File conference The resolution was weakest precIsely where the bureaucrats are the strongest -on how to organise the siraggie. Make all trade union lenders accountuble is an excellent principle, but it doesn't really tell the Lucas or Timex workers how to organise to avoid a sell-out.
The conference was not a real challenge to the power of the Communist Party in industry. IS is a long way off from being in the leadership of a mass rank-and-tile move Whut the conference did achieve for the IS was a consideruble consolidation of its base. But, at the sanse time, it showed how weak are the political foundations it has given to Red Weekly 12 April 1974 Page 3
British imperialism. I gravy bucket it will hang on to it with grim determination.
For the Southern burgeoisie the Council of Ireland, by seeming to offer unification, gives a sbred of cover to its collaboration with PROVOS REBOUND (These are an end to internmen! a phased witndrawal of troops, u firm date for complete withera wal of Britain from Ireland, and an amnesty for all political prisoners.)
But the political base of the Republicans has weakened. The no go areas ate gone, and the SDLP has
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RANK & FILE CONFERENCE DUCKS POLITICAL QUESTIONS