Labour Briefing no. 39

PHOTO: John Chapman

Be en

Democracy would go out of the window if the Tories win another chance to press home new

anti-union laws.

Unions would be handed over, bound and gagged, not to their members but to individual scabs, to the bosses, and to the courts under new Green Paper proposals unveiled by Employment Secretary Lord

Young.

Added to the armoury of draconian legislation already imposed on a prostrate TUC during seven years of Thatcherite “counter-revolution’’, the new proposals (see box) would tighten a rigid straitjacket that would make almost any form of active trade unionism, effective

strike action, or class solidarity unlawful. Of course, Alliance

leaders rushed to welcome this latest Tory onslaught: their employment spokesperson Malcolm Bruce greeted the Tory government's “‘conversion to substan’ acts of the

Alliance polic'

By JOHN LISTER

But Labour's leaders too have already tacitly conceded most of the key ciples to the Tories, and have consistently refused to pledge a full repeal of the existing anti-union legislation.

In the unions, the hardline right wing of the TUC (Hammond, Jordan, Golding) sees its future working hand in glove with the bosses. as a secondstring tier of management. The “centre’’ (like GMBATU leader John Edmonds) have reduced their ambitions to retaining a

membership by acting as cheap insurance brokers, legal advisors to individuals and holiday tour operators.

Any real spirit of trade unionism has long been extinguished in these.circles. Thatcher has merely taken

advantage of this weakness. The vanishing TUC

“left’’ typified by NUPE boss Tom Sawyer, appears to believe the issue is one of ideology — involving some kind of debating match against Thatcher's hit-squad.

The reality is that every concession , every retreat by the TUC bureaucracy has served simply to encourage the Tory offensive.

The latest Green Paper is the bitter fruit of the DeanDubbins Wapping betrayal — but also the outcome of all the miserable sell-outs since the 1980 Steel Strikes and the TUC’s

union laws of that year.

Since then, every major confrontation with the employers, their government and its laws has been hampered by blatant sabotage from at least part of the TUC leadership.

Small wonder that under the hammer of compulsory and voluntary cies,

redundan-

management _vications and attacks on shop stewards’ organisations, a growing bureaucratisation of the remaining structures and a

refusal of officials to organise new layers of low-paid and _ part-time

Staff, the unions have lost a massive 3 million members since 1979. What workers need to fight this new threat is a Labour and TUC campaign which drops the flowery phrases and subordinates the hunt for the Yuppie

vote — concentrating instead on basic class issues.

We need a Labour campaign which at a bare minimum:

@rejects the whole battery of Tory anti-union laws since 1979 and

gsr es an Sat ort a aera

Naa pig Miah pe oe

elections and ,

INSIDE

@Youth Conference @Missiles offer @Lesbian and Gay Rights legislation @Lessons of Greenwich

PHOTO: John Chapman

favour of individual poster

Perce)

* comp

pledges to repeal the lot at once;

@ gets off the fence, and sides on every issue with the shop floor workforce against management; with the low paid agai wealthy; with the victimi:

ed against the employers; with the pickets against the cops; with the exploited

against _— the

itself to enforce justice for the jailed and victimised _ miners, printworkers and other class struggle victims;

@ pledges to roll back the

‘and mass Pie a the in-

be awarded ‘unions effectively tea. 'g total jurisdic

Tory attacks and massively improve social security, health, education ..and housing.

We need a working class Programme to rally the trade union and working class votes, without which Labour cannot hope to beat Thatcher.

The fiasco of Greenwich, in the same week as Lord Young's latest arrogant challenge to the workers’ movement, shows. how far we have yet to go before we get such a leadership.

iy

ia

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page.2

““Now that homosexual

Lesbian and Gay Rights campaigns

The struggle for lesbian and gay rights in Haringey

Haringey Council's commitment to lesbian and gay rights, with its

introduction of positive

images of lesbians and gays in education, continues to come under attack.

A coalition of fundamentalist religious

activists, right wing Tories and known fascists has moved into Haringey to build on the hysteria whipped up by the right wing bigoted ‘‘Parents Rights Group’.

The government's paternal campaigns and Bills desperate to dictate morality, and media lies based on'homophobic and racist reporting have prepared the way. for -bigots. and extremist groups.

Despite these attacks Haringey temains isolated, with no support from the Labour Party Front bench or other Labour controlled local authorities. Ealing, faced with opposition, . has virtually backtracked..on its policy of

The Legislation for Lesbian and Gay Rights Campaign (LLGRC) has been launched to fight for an end to. the legal oppression of lesbian and gay people. A major conference will be 24th to

general election campaign. THERESA CONWAY and JAMIE GOUGH from the Campaign argue why and how you should support it.

ty is legal...’’ ‘“Lesbianism has never been legal.’’ How often these things are said, and how far they are from the truth!

The 1967 Act which is supposed to have “‘legalised homosexuality’ in fact simply removed penalties from sexual relations between men over 21 under very restricted circumstances. Acts of Parl and judges’ decisions mean that lesbian and gay sexuality is against “public policy" and “public morality”.

This basic homophobia underlies all dealings of the courts and the police with lesbian and gay people.

The law enshrines discrimin: tion against lesbian and gay people in the right to live with our children, in employment, and in housing. Young lesbian and gay people are often forcibly taken into ‘‘care’’ or “secure care”? because of their sexuality. Lesbian and gay organisations, publications, and switchboards are harassed and restricted by laws on “‘obsceni-

ty’, “indecency”, ‘corrupting public morals’, rand “conspiracy’”.

Public expressions of affection, as well as “propositioning’’ between lesbians and between gay men are illegal. The police harass and commit violence against openly lesbian and gay people, entrap and blackmail us, and carry out publicity-grabbing witch-hunts.

The law helps to keep lesbian and gay sexuality hidden. It makes social and __ political

By Leesa Herbert Leesa Herbert Positive Images

combatting the oppression of lesbians and gays.

The bigoted attacks have spread to Lewisham where the Tories have co-ordinated a

number of fundamentalist churches to oppose the Council's policies on lesbian

and gay rights (yet to be formulated) in a leaflet distributed to all households in the Borough, claiming that to ‘challenge inbuilt discrimination of lesbians and gays ‘will break up_ the family’*. Why? Because “it’s against nature’’ and "God says so’’.

Haringey Council, “in” the face of this pressure, has tried to keep its head down, It has taken seven months to produce a Borough-wide leaflet on their policy to combat the lies allowed to go unchallenged up till now. Unfortunately the —_longawaited leaflet only informed Haringey of its Lesbian and Gay Unit, with no mention of

Why lesbian and gay people want to

Lay down the law!

organisation by lesbian and gay people difficult, and it _makes everyday prejudice and violence against us appear respectable and normal.

With the election of a new Parliament imminent, the time ¢ to demand an end to this The labour

to this campaign. It should ensure that the Labour leadership ‘fights the election on the lesbian and gay rights platform agreed by Labour Party conference and speedily implements this policy once it is in office.

the Council's policy on lesbian and gay rights and why it is committed to the policy.

The opposition turned up in full force to last month’s full Council meeting: the ‘Parents Rights Group’’, plus. suitably

selected black and minority ;

ethnic right wingers claiming to represent their communities, religious fundamentalists, known,

National Front thugs, and’to”

cap it all the frail fasting vicar, Rev Rushworth-Smith, who hasn't eaten since Jan 12th, claiming he will fast to death if the Council, do not. reverse

their policy. Rushworth-Smith plus ‘supporters requested to

address the’ Council. This was denied by a weak front bench speech, and finally a vote. At this the opposition managed to totally disrupt the meeting, hurling abuse and threats to the lesbian and gay supporters also in the gallery.

The mayor suggested emptying the gallery, which many feared would end in violence, and finally chose to bring the police in to remave a

The Labour Campaign for Lesbian and Gay Rights has published its own proposals for changing the law, Legislaton for lesbian and gay rights. The pamphlet is very useful for campaigning. Copies can be ordered c/o LLGRC at £1 each (incl. p&p); or take more for

LLGRC, Room 221, 38 Mount Pleasant, London WCI1X 0AP 01-833 3860

MODEL RESOLUTION

The Legislation for Lesbian and Gay Rights Campaign has called an open conference on May 23rd-24th at the Camden Centre, London, to campaign for an end to discrimination in Jaw against lesbian and gay people. We recognise that lesbian

and gay people are discriminated against in all aspects of life,

and in particular by the law and the way in which it is implemented. We therefore support this conference and campaign, and agree to donate £....

Calling all Lesbian and Gay People!

The LLGRC has already received suport from a wide range of lesbian

and gay organisations, In the lead up to the conference in May, the

Campaign is organising discussions among lesbian and gay people about what changes we want in the law. Discussion groups among lesbians, black, elderly, and young lesbian and gay people, and lesbian and gay people with disabilities are meeting or are being set up, as well as local discussion groups. Contact the Campaign for more information. A leaflet addressed to lesbian and gay people is available. Invite a speaker to your lesbian/gay group.

noisy, black ‘Parents Rights Group" supporter. Angered by the council's failures to deal with the situation and the presence..of the police and likelihood'of violence the

> lesbian mae supporters left

the Council meeting,

Faced with this bigoted racist backlash in Haringey, Positive Images (the campaign group setup in support of the Council's policy to combat the lies) decided to step up thei campaign.

Haringey Black Action had been formed, as a group of Black Lesbian and gays working to counteract the reactionary and opportunist forces in the Black community strongly “objecting to the Council’s policy of ' Positive Images. This split in the black

community was clearly encouraged by the racist “divide and rule’’ _ tactics

exploited by the Tories and “Parents Rights Group’”. Haringey Black Action approached Positive Images with the suggestion of working jointly to mobilise for a national rally and march

through Haringey with: the themes ‘‘Fight the Backlash’; “Lesbians and Gays Fight Back’; Black Lesbians and Gays Fight Back’’.

Work has begun with a joint committee of eight working to mObilise:support in lesbian and gay communities and-groups, black and “minority” ethnic groups and campaigns, labour movement and trade unions, and all the left. The march will demonstrate against. the bigoted, homophobia | and racism. mobilising. in Haringey and the country.

The fight continues,.. with the ‘recent news of the formation of a Lotid6m based group “Londoners for Labour'’, which is. fighting to challerige the Lefts inc the Labour Party. As predicted the failure of Labour to win the Greenwich by-election is being blamed on the hard left candidate Deirdre Wood. Links have already been made to the “loony left’ policies such as those of lesbian and gay rights frightening away the electorate,

Locally. news has just

broken that Rushworth-Smith has stopped ‘his fast. He claims to have stopped to appeal to opponents from ethnic minority groups threatening to take the laws into their-own hands to make Haringey ‘reverse their policy = a further example of the racism of the dppostion.

Pressure is mounting both within and outside the Labour Party. We must’ show the bigots ‘end racists our opposition. in full strength and demonstrate to, Labour Party members, fearful as an election dfaws near, their need to stand up for.their policy and fight the backlash.

if Haringey capitulates on its positive images policy it will be a log’ not only to lesbian and gay’¢ampaigns but to all campaignsifighting oppression of minorities, The left must get to its feet and challenge. the backlash..

Details of the march and fally can be obtained from Positive Images and Haringey Black Action, c/o Reading Matters, Lymington Ave, London N22

Unity of the lesbian and gay movement with the labour movement: CND demo, 1980.

Wombourne 12 - Police nil!

Back in December, “Gas the gays’ Brownl (leader of S. Staffs district Council) advocated the final solution’’ to deal with AIDS.

He received the support of the Labour Group, whilst the Tories sang “Land of Hope and Glory’’

In response, 12 members of the Lesbian and Gay youth movement demonstrated = ~in his garden, and were arrested and viciously attacked by the local police.

After refusing them bail, magistrates dished out instant remands, and they spent the next week, in cluding Christmas, inside. From their cells they set up a defence campaign, and

By Tobie Glennie

—____. on being released began building support.

Public forums were arranged, and __ weekly meeting took place in London and Nottingham to organise the defence campaign. Other support groups emerged __in Wolverhampton, Leicester and Oxford.

The main function of the Defence Campaign was tc organise speakers and press coverage, raise money and build for the demo in Wombourne on February 23rd to coincide with the court case).

They spoke at 20 to 30 meetings, distributed a large number of regular

bulletins, and raised £500-£600.

The police eventually realised that their case wouldn't stick, and dropped all charges. Nevertheless, the demonstration went ahead, attracting 300

people.

The defendants felt the campaign was a real success, and were really encouraged by the amount of support received. They are keen to use their contacts and information to build a National Lesbian and Gay Defence Campaign and _ those interested in such a project can contact them at: NLGDC, c/o LGYM, BM GYM, London WC1 3XX.

PHOTO: Andrew Wiard (Repo!

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 3

Editorial

BRIEFING

LABOUR — TAKE THE POWER!

Blame our leaders — not the left!

en

The defeat of Labour in the London Labour Party wanted something. more. George Howarth, win huge public support by | Why won’t Kinnock fight the Greenwich by- are being portrayed as a than this. Chesterfield, Tony Benn keeping quiet about them. for our class with the election has opened the bunch of “‘loonies’’ who will Past experience’ shows fought a campaign based on On the contrary, theiripolicy conviction that _ Thatcher way for the inevitable lose Labour the election in that Labour will run into < socialist policies, run by the of dialogue with Sinn Fein, __ shows in fighting for hers?

f danlnati spite of the efforts of the trouble wherever election local Party, and wontheseat support for the Black Nor can we expect the REGEPRP OL RECAUHESIIONS ” ” Cisetsibie’ moderate campaigns are run on an against all predictions. community, for women, working class to support within the Party. members in other parts of apolitical basis. Since we are ‘We must not allow the lesbians and gays, was policies which _are

As usual, the'léft is being

the country.

the Party of social change —

right to pin the blame for

defended all down. the line,

indistinguishable from the

used as the scapegoat. The Certainly there ..were and the only Party of real electoral defeat on the left, both by Livingstone and the SDP’s. Faced with a choice Greenwich Party has been major. problems with the social change — we will the blame must. be firmly _ majority Labour Group. In between the SDP and ‘SDP accused of choosing a campaign fought in always be faced with the placed where it belongs, on blaming the London Labour — Mark II’’, they prefer the candidate who was on the Greenwich. These problems, challenge of confronting the them, andon their bankrupt Left for the Greenwich real thing, or else they do “loony left’, however, were not the result prejudices and assumptions _ policies. defeat, Kinnock is trying to _not vote at all.

unrepresentative of the ofa left wing candidate who _ of the status quo if we are to Now Labour Party policy cover his own refusal to It has been said that the Party and of the loyal put off the voters. survive. ‘‘Agitate! Educate! on the rights of lesbians and campaign on Labour Party trouble with the campaign

Labour voters,

The right wing are using his opportunity to step up the witch-hunt against the

Left policies were never put. to the people of Greenwich. The problems were the result of a take-over

Organise!’” — for us, there is no avoiding such tasks. And if we expect others to come to us, the very first

gay men, passed by an overwhelming 80% majority at last year’s Conference, is being blamed as well. Pat

policy.

The question is a very simple one. Is the Labour Party prepared to defend

Labour fought in Greenwich was that it was a right wing campaign, with a left wing candidate. This was a symptom of the: problem,

left, in particular the . ‘by. the central © party precondition is to show that Hewitt’s letter, leaked from _ people against their

London Left. The launch of ~ organisation. Party we believe in our own Kinnock’s office, argues discrimination or not! however, rather than the “Londoners for. Labour”, members in Greenwich were policies’ ourselves. The that “‘the gays and lesbians —_ Nothing is ever won without ~_ fundamental problem itself. headed by Brian Nicholson kept well away from the moment the electorate in issue is costing us dear fighting for it. That is what While the present Party

of the T&G leayes little room for doubt as to their

campaign; it was made clear from the start that their role

Greenwich began. to sense Labour’s lack of confidence

amongst the pensioners.”’ Again, the “‘loony left’* are

the London left have tried to do. Kinnock should do that

leadership remains in power CLPs will continue to come

intentions —tosetinreverse was to be confined to in its own messge, the rot blamed. It is more evidence too. What is he afraid of? Is | under pressure to select all the gains made for canvassing and pushing — began to set in. too that Kinnock wants to it sounheard of for usinthe candidates acceptable to the campaigning class politics in _ leaflets through doors. All Proof that “‘left wing drop any policy, including - Labour Party to argue our Tory press — candidates London over the past ten the political decisions. were policies’. were not in — on issues which have the case — whether with who will run apolitical years, in effect the brand-of made by full-time Party themselves*the problem is backing of the whole Party, pensioners,’ with young campaigns resting on the politics associated with the officials who decided that the fact that despite which either the media people, with trade unionists folorn hope of gaining name of London Labour the best approach was to everything, the drop in the attacks or which is not or with anyone else? When — media support. The problem Briefing. avoid politics altogether and Labour vote in Greenwich immediately popular have we ever won a victory __will.not be resoved until we

Another aspect of this present Deirdre Wood as a was actually less than the amongst one of Labour’s on any other basis? And have a leadership © which campaign is the crude ‘‘woman with anice smile’ drop in the vote in election ‘‘target’’*groups. doesn’t Thatcher in her own _ understands. our own attempt to stir up anti- who “understands _ Knowsley, where the The radical” policies way show that it is by movement's political power, London. feeling-=-iny the — ~Greenwich’’, jot. imposed candidate was the adopted by the GLC apie: cause.and- , : gone

Briefing Conference

Socialist Policies for a

Labour Victory «<<

cxalis March 28th -29th creck?

Opening Plenary Apartheid 3. Fighting Social Policy Speakers include: llam-lpm 4. Racism and British _ privatisation llam-lpm Joan Twelves, Eric Heffer MP Imperialism 4. Fighting for our 1. Devolution and Rowland Sheret, Liz

Mildred Gordon PPC

Narendra Makanji, Secretary, LP Black Sections

International Affairs

2-4pm Workshops:

Speakers include: Nadine Finch, Jeremy Corbyn, Anita Patel, Jim Boumelha, SWSC.

Economic Strategy

economic policy 5. What kind of economic growth? Speakers include: Andy Porter, Alan Thornett, Jeanette Findlay, Geoff

the national question 2. Restoring local democracy

‘3, The Tories’ police state

4. Tory attacks on the unions

Short, Tony Richardson.

Closing Plenary 2-4pm Speakers include:

1. Getting Britain out 4-6pm Martin, Phil Hearse: 5. “New morality” Joy Hurcombe, PPC of Ireland Workshops: and the rights of the John Palmer,

2. NATO, the 1. Taking over the oppressed Socialist Society Warsaw Pact and City Evening Social 6. Combatting the Sharon Atkin, PPC Non-alignment 2. What kind of media Labour Briefing

3. Breaking links with nationalisation?

Registration £2.50 for weekend, £1.50. per day (half price unwaged) From: Labour Briefing, 51 Musgrove Road, London SE14 5PP.

PHOTO: Andrea Campbell

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 4

Trade Union Briefing

‘NCU demo, February '87

NCU fights victimisations

BT management in the London City district have suspended 6 officers and members ‘of the NCU London North Central Internal and City branches and charged a further 4 with disciplinary Offences arising out of the recent NCU pay

Most of the charges relate to alleged picket line incidents.

One of those charged saw a scab on the train into London and later allegedly said to him “It’s a small world’’ as the scab crossed the picket Jine. For this he has been charged with “threatening’’ the scab!

By Pete Cooper NCU

Another successfully defended himself against. a mangement charge, only to be accused a week later of industrial sabotage before the strike.

The four City members who have not been suspended, have been moved from their normal workplaces, to _ the. relative backwater “of Bermondsey (apologies Bermondsey!). One of them has now been moved out of the City branch area altogether.

Management has physically

removed: both branch officers from their normal premises.

The fact that all the accused were prominent or active in the strike, and the nature of the charges, clearly indicate that BT is out to weaken the union by victimisation tactics.

Fred Clarke, for example, was picket organiser, and is currently standing for Secretary of the city branch. Similarly John Moynihan of LNCI took a leading role in the strike in London

Manny Blake, secretary of the City branch, speaking. at_a Broad Left rally, stated that he believed that BT intend to sack the suspended members, a view shared by other City members. City branch have circulated all

NCU branches calling on them to pressurise the NCU leadership to defend these members effectively.

BT clearly wants to intimidate branch officials and. union activists in the union as a whole.

Furthermore, they want to weaken the union in City District in preparation for inevitable future

confrontations, while possibly lulling the rest of the union into a false sense of security — although charges may be in the pipeline in the Westminster District.

Campaign

An active defence campaign across the union is needed. This is not a local matter. A policy of national industrial action in the event of any sackings must ‘be fought for as a central part of the Broad Left campaign for the forthcoming Executive Council elections.

The defence cannot be left to the tender mercies of J. Golding Esq., the NCU __ general Secretary, who has a few scores to settle on his own account,

Bring down Baker!

By Ken Jones Socialist Teachers Alliance

—— Eight years of Tory attacks on the teaching force have now reached a new peak. With the passing of Kenneth Baker's ‘Pay and conditions’’ Bill, teachers have now been deprived of the right to negotiate. Baker has given himself

the » power to impose settlements, and has abolished negotiating bodies.

His punishment for 2 years of industrial action —_is sweetened by short-term pay increases — up to a point some £1,700 below the point arrived at in negotiations between _ teachers and employers. It is accompanied by the imposition of tough new conditions of service: compulsory “‘cover’’ for absent staff; a longer working week; assessment; a charter for heads and managers.

Baker aims to create a new kind of teaching — force: submissive, unorganised in trade union terms, resigned to greater management control — the kind of teachers who

ad

t NUT/NAS-UWT

Joi

London strike and rally against Baker: Monday March 16th, 1pm, Kennington Park

will not present obstacles to the implementation of Tory education policy.

But he’s —_ gambling Gambling that there will be no effective resistance to his plans — hoping that divisions among teachers, and the confusion of their own strategies will allow him an easy run.

His hopes can be proved false. It is essential that teachers make unworkable the contract he imposes — by refusing to operate the new

conditions. It is important that

teachers begin to plan a reopening of their salary campaign. But for these actions to be fully effective they need:

@unity between the two main. unions. — NUT and NAS/UWT — which are already taking joint protest action;

@support from Labour Councils — which must not

act as policing agents for Baker's settlement; @an attempt to regain the

high ground in public debate about schools and education — to win away from Baker the public support he covets.

Baker has claimed that he will bring peace and calm to the schools. He should be shown that __anti-trade unionism and injustice are not the way to get it.

Keith, Joseph, his predecessor, was brought down by his inability to: deal with teachers’ demands: For Baker, the same spectre of failure can be made to loom.

We unreservedly carry on our struggle to expose and condemn the ballot gers. and corruption within UCATT and to cleanse our union of this cancerous presence.

We of course also strive to replace present malpractice

with healthy democratic organisation.

There are now definite signs that the UCATT

General Secretary and Executive Council (EC) are starting to react to the pressure from below.

Some guilt has at last been acknowledged. Scapegoats have been found in order to attempt to cover up the much deeper and poisonous corruption which exists at national, some regional, and local levels within our union.

A two man enquiry team have presented a report to the EC which in essence supports internal union charges against Les Woods, the last Geneal Secretary, for misappropriation of union funds via his acquisition of a new union car just prior to his retirement. What of the people still active in the union, who aided and abetted him in this disgraceful action? We await results!

The Executive Council have agreed:to_re-run..the General Council Election which returned Michael O"Brien as the Eire representative in December 1985. The basis of the re-run is that O'Brien's branch, Limerick, returned.a grossly inflated vote for him.

Why has he not been expelled, along with all the others who directly assisted ~“him= in this gross deception? {s it. because O’Brien and the same Limerick Branch were involved in the now infamous ballot rigging for the UCATT Executive position in December 1984 and March 1985? After ballot rigging was proved, there was a re-run for this position.

If O'Brien was expelled it

could quite conceivably lead to his exposing others, more senior than him in the union, for Serious malpractices and corruption. O'Brien actually has the affrontery to appeal against the re-run to the UCATT General Council!

Why have none of the other proven ballot riggers and corruptors been expelled by the UCATT EC and General Secretary? Is it because in protecting them the EC and General Secretary are protecting themselves?

Now we find that General Secretary Albert Williams, the Oliver North of UCATT HQ, is refusing point blank to. allow

olitics rears its head!

The “yes” vote in the CPSA political fund ballot was a welcome relief to Broad Left activists who have had a rough time recently.

The result of 57,553 in favour to 21,497 against in a 53% turnout represents a decisive shift in the political consciousness of the Union.

The image of neutral civil servants servicing whoever happens to be in government has been undermined by the attacks mounted on the union by the Tories, but the Broad Left has been instrumental in steering ‘the Union in @ clear political direction.

By Alastair Wallace CPSA Broad Left

Labour Party affiliation, which is already CPSA Conference policy, will be one of the central items on the agenda in the coming year, particularly with an approaching General Election.

Ironically, while the political fund ballot has been taking place there have been major political attacks on two of the largest sections of the Union: DHSS and Department of Employment (DE)

The CPSA has been served with injunctions for instructing its members in _ these departments to take action in support of the unemployed and claimants.

In the DE, the Section Executive Committee (SEC) was served with a writ for sanctioning industrial action against “ethnic monitoring’’ of claimants, long opposed as racist by the CPSA. Despite severe (some say willful) mishandling of the whole issue by the Kinnockite SEC, all trade’ “unionists. should recognise the dire implications of this use of anti-trade union laws.

In the DHSS, the tale is similar. The Broad Leftcontrolled SEC initiated a

campaign of non-co-operation with parts of the new Social Security Act. In the face of the possible escalating ‘of action across the whole of the DHSS, management served an injunction — taken out under

Labour's 1974 Trade Union Laws (an illustration of the dangers of Labour's current proposals for trade unions, which go far beyond those of 1974),

In both cases, the union has been forced to back down. Action can now only be sanctioned. for so-called trade union reasons, such as accommodation problems or danger to staff.

Sharp end Civil Service workers, along with other public sector

employees, have long been at the sharp end of Tory trade union policy. Because they recognise the importance of our role, the Tories have been all too ready to try out their anti-union laws against us.

Cracks appear!

publication of the traditional verbatim report of the 1986 UCATT Conference held in Bournemouth.

He has also scrapped an article on the same. 1986 Conference, by a. respected journalist, which had been commissioned by UCATT for publication in the official union mouthpiece Viewpoint

The basis, we hear, for scrapping the verbatim report and the article is that both of these honestly reflected the widespread criticism, and sometimes outright condemnation, of the General Secretary and the Executive Counc!

We have a Dictator as a General Secretary. We have-an Executive Council who,. it is now obvious, condone and may even orchestrate ballot rigging and corruption within our union.

CO ——$—$— By The Building Worker Group

—_————_$_—$_—

But, thankfully, we also have individuals and groups of members. in UCATT who are not prepared to let things rest until a// the corruptors are swept out of UCATT.

The campaign for UCATT democracy took another step forward at the London meeting on February 14th. A very politically and industrially representative group of UCATT members debated and then yoted-..unanimously fora UCATTT Democracy Campaign to be built around these four basic demands:

@the expulsion of all ballot riggers and their supporters;

@ for a-national/ay leadership as opposed to the present five full-timers in the executive;

@ for an annual delegate conerence as opposed to the present ‘once every two year affairs; conference to be the only body with the authority to change the rules of the union;

‘@ for the complete restoration of all his rights as a UCATT member to Dominic Helier.

We ask all UCATT members who read Labour Briefing to take the campaign for UCATT democracy and these demands into the union. We ask all the Labour Party members to take the campaign into the heart of the Labour Party itself. The campaign must be political as well as industrial. A// the present members of the UCATT EC are in the Labour Party as fare the General and Assistant General Secretary!

While Eric Heffer, a decent MP and UCATT member, was being voted off the Labour Party NEC, Jack Rogers, a corrupt member of the UCATT EC was being voted on.

We ask all trades unionists who read Labour Briefing to take the campaign for Democracy into the TUC. How can we Building Workers — or the working class itself — rely ‘on Albert Williams & Co., who sit on the TUC Construction Committee, to even begin to represent our interests?

How: ‘can we begin to tackle the deaths, on average, of over 150 buildig workers every year in so-called site accidents? Murder in the name of profit we call it!

How can we tackle the needs of millions of working class people living in sub-standard housing? Not to mention the members of our class who have no homes at all? How can we possibly fight the blacklist, the gangsterism, the, mass unemployment which is endemic in our industry today?

How can we fight all of these things with a General Sectetaryship and Executive Council who are so obviously corrupt?

How much longer can these people be allowed to remain within the Labour Party and the trades union —_ movement? Imagine how long they'd have been, allowed to stay if, they'd been‘on the revolutionary left!

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 5

Trade Union Briefing

Hangers

celebrate in the courts!

On February 19th, FTAT and TASS solicitors obtained a deferment in the Law Courts over injunctions issued by BTR against the two unions and 45 of the sacked limbmakers, preventing them demonstrating at

Vincent Square, BTR’s headquarters.

Over the past 15 days, charges had been withdrawn against 42 of the men. However, Les Gould, Steve _ Blease,

Graham Croucher and the unions were still cited.

On Friday March 6th the judge threw the case out and ordered BTR to pay the costs. The men felt quite victorious indeed.

Dave Christmas of the disputes committee, who attended the proceedings and had in fact obtained a sworn affidavit to present in court, said he was very pleased that it was never needed. He believed that the sacked workers and the’ unions had been vindicated by. the Law Courts.

There's been small support from the Parliamentary Labour Party. Michael Meacher came down to Roehampton on March 2nd to visit. the-sacked workers, but only stayed for five minutes.

The effect on disabled

patients must be disastrous but

information is. being

By Kathy Pick Wandsworth councillor

Putney CLP worker has disclosed that there are several cases of

people awaiting limbs who are now severely depressed over the situation. One patient is in hospital and attempted suicide recently. Names obviously can't be revealed, but members of the local Labour Group will press for numbers to be made public.

Kelly's in Dundee, another Hanger’s branch, has’ been visited by — Roehampton strikers and they are finally agreeing to cut down on overtime work.

The Women's Support Group met recently and several events are planned. There will be a jumble sale on March 21st (the last one raised £450!) and a May Day social for the sacked workers and their families. The women will visit local Tory MP, David Mellor, in his surgery on March 14th and plan to participate with their families in the Hands Across Britain event.

Meanwhile, Company Director Dr Hiddlestone has said categorically that there will be no more offers made to the sacked worker

Please send messages of support and/or _ financial support for the sacked workers and their families to TASS, c/o Steve Blease, 520 Road,

Fighting the new onopolies

The Tories have withdrawn the threat of immediate legislation to force councils to privatise their services; but the pressure to privatise remains, as Councils face budget crises — and the Tory lesgislation is postponed, not cancelled. In the second part of a feature on privatisation of NHS services, JOHN LISTER looks at the reality of ‘‘competitive’’ tendering for the companies involved, and some of the struggles against

Gloomy contractors hit the skids

Matters have changed dramatically since the heady days of Spring 1985 when

Reflections (newsletter of the private. contractors’ organisation, the CCMA). was. boldly headlined “We Are Winning” and went on to assert:

“We are currently winning over 75% of the competitive tenders in the NHS, which is well above: our previous expectations. And there is no indication that this ratio will decline."*

But in the last year, more and more CCMA member firms have run into financial pro-

Mitchant, | blems,and ot ¢ begun to mere half-dozen of the CCMA’s

46 founder companies have between them cornered the lion’s share of all NHS. contracts awarded.

Two of the original fancied front-runners. — Crothalls and OCS — suffered badly as a result of discrediting strikes at Barking. and Addenbrookes Hospitals, followed by further embarrassing revelations about their standards of cleaning.

OCS has now withdrawn from NHS tendering, while Crothalls lost their Maidstone DHA contract, failed to win renewal of their prestige New East Surrey Hospital contract, faced fines, penalties, and angry NHS management in Croydon, Riverside, East Birmingham and South Warwickshire; and lost out to a much dearer inhouse tender in West Suffolk. Losses on Crothalls’ NHS operations were a major factor in an overall deficit notched up

Ridley retreats from tender spot

Laws to force local councils to put a wide range of services out to competitive tender have been shelved by Environment Secretary Nicholas Ridley until after the next election.

Ridley claimed technical delays in drafting the legislation as the reason for his decision to hold back on the shake-up, which could axe tens of thousands of jobs in services presently costing £2.5 billion each year.

But it is known that many Tory councils are far from enthusiastic about the proposals.

Similar requirements have led to a series of disasters and an overall drop in standards when applied to NHS ancillary services.

The local government legislation was designed to enforce a more rigid system of

~~

tendering upon elected councils than has so far been imposed upon over 200 nonelected health authorities.

While health ministers have cajoled and arm-twisted their appointees into carrying through competitive tendering, a steadily declining proportion of the NHS contracts have gone to private firms — many of them. subsequently producing embarrassing scandals.

By Harry Sloan

The private contractors have squealed long and loud that they have been let down by the government, and want the goalposts moved again in their favour.

The local government legislation sought to. achieve this by compelling councils to accept the lowest tender — and, by. artificially: tipping the ‘odds against any tender from

the existing ‘‘in-house’’ staff.

But while it offered rich pickings to the two main monopoly firms now tendering for public sector cleaning contracts this form of ‘cowboys charter’’ offered little attraction for local councillors. Unlike the stooges who sit on health authorities, councillors are periodically forced to stand for election and have to account for the level and quality of service they provide.

Ridley’s postponement of the legislation is no thanks to the feeble union campaigns that had barely got off the ground — and should not lead to any relaxation among the public sector unions.

It is likely in the short run to redouble the efforts to bring private firms into the remaining NHS contracts. It will also lead to even more sustained lobbying of Tory

_ councillors, in preparation for .@ renewed

onslaught, . if Thatcher wins re-election.

by the Pritchards.

As a result, Pritchard/Crothall has now been taken over by the Hawley Group, which has also bought up the Home Counties Cleaning Group. Hawley entered NHS cleaning in 1983, setting up a_— subsidiary, Mediclean, specifically to take advantage of the government’s privatisation programme.

In early tendering, Mediclean established itself as the market leader, managing to scoop the lion’s share of private contracts, including a number of large London hospitals (St_ Helier, Hammersmith, St George’s, St James's, and Ealing).

Meanwhile, the less profitable Brengreen Group, which owns Exclusive (another NHS contract cleaning operation) has been swallowed up by the BET combine which already owned Initial and ICC.

Hawley and BET — both multinational corporations — now dominate public sector contract cleaning in Britain. Others, like Reckitts, Blue Arrow, and Sunlight, along with catering market leaders Spinneys, have pulled out of tender-

parent company,

ing. In only three years, “competitive tendering” has been reduced to. a near-

monopoly carve-up.

Patients pay the price

While standards of _ basic hygiene collapse in hospital wards, and patients are denied the friendly attention and extra care traditionally given by NHS domestics, the experienced NHS ancillary workforce is being broken up under the hammer blows of wage cuis, cruel, unpaid increases in work effort,

“of part-time

National demo in support of Barking’s striking domestics — June, 1984.

redundancies, and a wholesale demolition. of the conditions painfully established by health unions over the years.

Both under private firms, who rely upon. the exploitation staff, 75% of whom work less than the 16 hours a week which would offer them legal protection, sickness, holiday, and pension benefits; and under new ‘inhouse tenders’’ which slash hours, jobs, and bonuses, and increase workload, staff turnover is increasing to the levels of fastfood joints.

It is important’ to recognise that_ these low-paid jobs are traditionally held by women, and in many areas these are overwhelmingly women from ethnic minorities, Reduced job opportunities and heavy cuts in wage levels for fewer hours of work will have a severe impact upon these women.

Clearly this does not disturb managements such as those at NE Thames, whose Strategic Plan cynically points out that:

“The number of the unemployed appears set to remain high for some years to come, especially amongst the unskilled. A shortage of ancillary staff is therefore most unlikely.”*

The NHS experience will be used by the Tories and the employers in their attempts to tighten the noose on local ‘government services.

Had the early strikes against NHS privatisation — especially the 18-month struggle. by the Barking Hospital women (which NUPE’s Rodney Bickerstaffe once tashly described as ‘Our Cortonwood""), —, been, given the kind of national support

that was needed”(and called for by. NUPE’s 1984 Conference), the picture might have been very different. Even with limited support, Crothall and OCS found it impossible to recover from the impact of the tenacious strikes at Barking and Addenbrookes Hospitals.

The women who struck for months at Scarsdale Hospital and argued that the ICC tender was unworkable have been vindicated, and the firm removed after one yar; the women who staged a strike against competitive tendering at Oxford's Littlemore Hospital succeeded in defending their jobs and services. The rolling strike promoted by local leaders of both NUPE and COHSE in Sunderland forced the local health authority to halt its tendering programme.

In contrast, wherever privatisation has nor been fought, it has rolled in, crushing jobs, ‘conditions, and union organisation as well as patient care. 34,000 full-time jobs lost since 1983 amounts to probably double that number of parttimers out of work.

“In-house” tenders, compiled in many cases with union collaboration, have also take a savage toll of jobs, and can be just as destructive for union organisation — producing such rapid turnover of demoralised part time staff that there is no time to recruit them to a union before they leave!

Councils have to be forced to take a stand against this kind of thing in local government. This means that unions have to prepare for action: learn the lessons of the NHS setbacks, and this time.come:out fighting on all fronts!

PHOTO: Stefano Cagnoni (Report

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 6

Youth Briefing: LPYS

Black Sections stand for ' YS NEC place

Like last year the Black Sections are standing-a candidate for. the YS’s__ NEC position. We reprint here then initial statement of their candidate,

STEVE JOMOA. _eeee ere

I’m standing to inject into a sterile YS leadership an infusion of mass campaigning, radical policies rooted in the most mil tant section of the working class, black youth.

Black youth have clearly demonstrated their anger against the oppressive capitalist state. From the uprisings in Tottenham we have seen them come under the brutal force of the state, facing heavy sentences, in some cases 8 years for throwing stones. These issue the YS should take up now. (Last year they didn’t. London YS conference voted down resolutions for black self-organisation and support for self-defence campaigns.)

Black youth in struggle identify with the rising militancy in Azania. Our policy on Azania is anti-imperialist, revolving around the national question, the fight for land and freedom. We should support all liberation struggles and independent trade unions in Azania, It will be the black masses who liberate themselves. It is not for Britain to decide how, when or where.

The same applies to Ireland. We are for immediate British withdrawal and self-determination for the Irish. There is a parallel between Irish and black people’s struggles. The YS leadership doesn’t support such liberation struggles whether in Central America, Azania, Ireland, or Palestine.

Race attacks on our community have increased, often resulting in injury or murder. Trevor Ferguson, for example, was a black youth blinded by 20 white youths in Newham. Newham Black Sections supported the picket of Newham police station and gave active solidarity to the campaign.

... Where was the YS leadership?

Police-are-an-aggressive, paramilitary force. They use seigelike tactics, invading black commun tes like the Broadwater Farm estate. ‘‘Sus ”’ is being reintroduced through the back door. Black youth, already hammered by unemployment, are harassed by stop and search tactics. We call for the democratic control of the police and elimination of the fascist element.

Finally, the ‘Black and Asian Advisory Committee’’, BAAC. A neo-colonialist body, white race experts advise on issues concerning black people. Linda Douglas, the YS NEC representative, should resign her seat on the BAAC immediately. It is purely tokenistic and an example of the divide and rule tactics of Labour's right-wing leadership.

Black Sections represent a demand for political power coming out of our community’s struggles. Black people have organised defence campaigns and demonstrations for years. Black Sections are about developing a national framework for these struggles so that the experiences and skills can be fed in. to benefit the whole movement.

YOUTH BRIEFING»

For details of Youth Briefing meetings contact Fran Rayner, Flat 7, 35 Maresfield Gdns, London NW3 {01-431 0357)

STUDENT BRIEFING

For details of Student Briefing meetings contact Patrick Baker, 6, Clissold Court,

* Greenway Close, Green Lanes, Stoke Newington, London N4. (01-802 9097)

Briefing Youth

RAFFLE Prizes include: Bottle of whisky Trotsky photograph book Tickets 20p from Fran Rayner (01 431 0357) and at Briefing events Draw at LPYS conference

YS Regional Conference round-up West Midlands Region

PHOTO: John Smith (IFL)

1982 “Trade union rights for YOPS’ march: since then, the LPYS has shrunk.

The YS leadership seemed pleased that this Conference, under attack before it had even begun, was cut back to a one day event.

It meant they could go and canvass for a nice Euro MP instead of talking about boring things like the witch-hunt.

This major discussion was rushed through in the afternoon, because they'd spent the entire morning on South Africa — an important discussion, but not necessarily advanced by an extended contribution on the leadership's line by a speaker form SOLSAY (Socialist Links with South African Youth, which I'd never heard of before).

When = Sparkbrook —_—YS, sponsoring a South African resolution, refused to accept an amendment which would have counterposed work in the YS to work in the AAM, the Regional Committee called for a vote against the resolutions — hardly the way to build socialist links.

Most worthy of note are the things that didn’t happen —

In Yarmouth (miles from anywhere) Briefing supporters were the main opposition to the YS

Southern Region Eepletn

The Sawyer proposals dominated this year's By Jon Green Southern Region LPYS

conference. debated a wide range of

The Militant leadership of Given” pee Ser tea Rhine the LPYS put a lot of effort in. SIV87_ ové Beereunng int Turing an. This part of the conference

was stage-managed as a Reiied ihe conference: morale boost to the rank and

Despite a regional drop from _file. 57 LPYS brances to 46, the A. speech from the Vice number of branches voting at Chair of the LPYS, was followthe conference went up from ed by a tape of the youth 24 to 31. There were fewer debate at Labour Party conopposition branches this year ference. Then the proposals and no witch-hunting bran- were discussed with some of ches at all the best speeches of the There were a number of weekend defending the record guest speakers including Eric of the LPYS.

Heffer, Dennis Skinner, two The debate was inspirin,

sacked NGA workers and a but there was a big contradi

striker from Wheeler's _ tion in what the delegates said restaurant. The conference and what the LPYS is actually

conference. — the Sawyer doing to defeat the proposals. _ proposals — was the subject of

The statement passe: a fringe meeting on the the conference says Saturday night, at which Youth welcome the discussion cur- Briefing had a speaker. rently underway in the Party Youth Fightback’s speaker and the wider labour move- left before the fringe meeting ment...on improving. youth began, so we could not discuss organisations." But, as many Youth Fightback’s position delegates pointed out, the pur- (“Drive Milizant into the sea’ pose of the Sawyer proposais. © — which isn’t very helpful in is to “tame the youth fighting a witch-hunt!). movement.” However, we were able to

The problem-is that Militant discuss with Militant, and to want to take part in the con- _hear the views of other people sultation process set up by too. Sawyer. But the consultation Militant argued that the process is the mechanism be- LPYS should take part in the ing used by the leadership of | NEC consultation process, the Labour Party to smash the _ accepting, with some LPYS as it now is, and should modifications, all the rule be rejected by the LPYS and all__changes except the reduction of those opposed to witch-hunts. _ the age limit to 21.

The LPYS must fight the Thus they accept that the Sawyer proposals if it wants | NEC has the right to impose to keep its autonomy. restructuring on the LPYS.

* Fight the witch-hunt! «

By Chloe Hood Sparkbrook LPYS

ee fo discussion on women’s issues, black people or lesbian and gay rights. The one resolution on women, under the heading of Economic policy, fell because..no. one turned up to move it.

Mark Meredith, moving an anti-witch-hunt resolution from Ladywood YS (controlled by the leadership), said “Comrades (sic), the first thing we have to recognise about the Sawyer proposals is that in some ways they're very progressive, even though it’s a blatant witch-hunt.’’ The fact. that it's a progressive witch-hunt made us all feel much better...

Under his leadership the regional YS has been reduced to a conference of 50 people, 20 of whom were delegates. He was elected unopposed to the YS National Committee.

Following the Conference, there was an evening social. | can’t tell you about it, because | decided I'd like to have a good time. | stayed at home and watched the telly.

Eastern Region

By Diana Paton Watford Central LPYS

They refer to “the opportunity” for the LPYS to get what it has been wanting for years (e.g. involvement of Trade Union youth), missing the point that the proposals as whole are an attack on the YS. The statement from the regional youth committee did not even say that the proposals are-an attack.

The debate on youth organisation was mainly taken up with replying to the points Briefing made. The Militant obviously took these points seriously, trying to answer us and not just insult us (although we were told we are ostriches for opposing the consultation process!).

Even if Militant won the vote at the end of the day, Briefing youth managed to ‘convince many of the people there of the importance of building a broadbased campaign to defend the YS and fight the witch-hunt.

Soci wha

The dayschool aims to be a campaigning and organising forum.

Young people need to get together to discuss the vicious and far-reaching attacks of recent months on abortion rights, the kind of sex education taught in schools and Labour council initiatives on lesbian and gay rights.

We want to understand what we’re up against so we can fight back against it.

More fundamentally, we want to discuss | what sexuality has to do with the workings of power in capitalist society, by including workshops on women at work and on socialist feminism. We want to know what kind of socialist feminism young women are creating.

Historically, what —_ has always distinguished socialist feminism is a totalising view of capitalist society. Socialist feminists like Clara Zetkin and Alexandra Kollontai have been concerned with questions of imperialism, fascism and revolution itself,

At first sight it might seem as if young women today are forced to take a more fragmented view of society. Their political experience has

Gay pride demo, 1977: this ani

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 7

Youth Briefing: our. Dayschool

alist feminism —

’s it to us?

By Fran Rayner Youth Briefing

been during a slump, during a period when the left is small.

Their experience of work is ‘of part-time, temporary, low- “training” schemés or unemployment Young women are growing up with their sexuality strictly controlled

Yet socialist feminism can still provide us with that universal view of our society. We have always believed that questions of abortion and violence against women are social questions rather than individual ones. We have an analysis of the family which not only tries to explain how domestic violence happens, but also how the role young women play in the family conditions the type of jobs which they are crowded into.

Our complaints against the pitiful sex education taught in schools are part of complaints against the class expectations of the education system.

We want the socialist feminist movement to respond to the particular problems of young women in its outlook and organisation, but we firmly believe that socialist feminism is a key tool in our contemporary political practice:

Scsiadeaphed

YOUTH BRIEFING

DAYSCHOOL

on SEXUALITY March 21st

organi

PHOTO: Andrew Wiard (Report)

gay liberation.

Polytechnic of Central London

(Marylebone Road site, Baker St 2 opposite Baker St tube station) Following the success of the last dayschool held by

Briefing Youth on international issues, we are ing a further dayschool to discuss various issues relating to women’s liberation and lesbian and

Further details from Fran Rayner, Flat 7, 35

Maresfield Gdns, London NW. we “431 —

images

JANE CONNOR, for Youth Briefing, spoke to Maureen, who works on Haringey Council’s Lesbian and Gay Youth Project.

Jane: Can you tell me briefl about the Project and its aims? Maureen: The Project is funded by Haringey Council and was set up in November. We aim to identify the needs of young lesbians and gay men and to make contact with them — that’s the hard part, as there’s nowhere in the Borough for lesbian and gay youth to meet.

As it’s a development project, we're very pushed for

Jane: What kind of pressures do you come under as an out lesbian youth worker — and as a young lesbian yourself? Maureen: Well, not everybody who works for the Council is exactly committed to the aims of the project. When I'm introduced to other workers, it’s always “This is Maureen, she’s a lesbian outreach

worker.”

People’s faces fall to the floor and they don’t say anything, just sit and nod their heads. I think people try to make me invisible.

Now there are two other workers — a Black lesbian and

PHOTO: John Sturrock (Report)

a Greek Cypriot man, so we're even more threatening because it raises the issue of race as well. As a gay man, Kyriacos has been targetted by sections of the community as a socalled AIDS carrier, and he’s had the hardest time.

Jane: How do you think the Project relates to Haringey Council's “Positive Images” initiative?

Maureen: \t’s such a “‘hot topic’” here at the moment that for those young people to come out and to contact us is very hard.

At the moment we're setting up a lesbian and gay youth event, because we feel that it’s the best way to open the door to these young people and find out their needs, We are having to be a bit discreet about

Jane: Do you think that within the Council there's any conflict of priorities? Clearly there are some Councillors who are pushing the issue of race — saying that because Black people in Haringey are the most oppressed, they should get most resources. How do you think we can challenge those ideas? Maureen: \t is being challenged by the setting up of groups like Haringey Black Action, Positive Images, and Lesbians and Gays in Education, These groups show that lesbians and gays come from all backgounds, cultures, histories. It’s a long fight and Haringey still has a long way to go in developing its equal opportunities policies, particularly for young people.

DEMONSTRATE! Sat May 2

Details from Positive Images

or Haringey Black Action, c/o

Reading Matters, Lymington ‘Ave, London N22.

where it is and when it is because of the backlash from the Parents’ Rights Group and the New Patriotic Movement, We're constantly worried by all the shit that’s flying around, and we don’t want the event disrupted. It’s going to be an evening event, with theatre, music, discussions. We hope it’s a way of breaking down the isolation that young lesbians and gays experience.

ip

POSITIVE IMAGES and Haringey Black Action

ILEA ‘has a long history — though not long enough — of lesbian and gay youth work. For instance, ILEA funds 13 lesbian and gay youth groups and is now producing a very comprehensive fact pack. It has lesbian and gay youth workers — that’s the kind of thing we'd like to see in Haringey. Information isn’t available in our youth clubs and community centres so lesbian and gay youth remain frighteningly isolated

One of the main aims of the Project is to make sure that

relevant information is available, and that there is provision for lesbian and gay youth, much more than the ‘one night at one youth, club that’s currently on offer.

We need “positive images” in the youth clubs to confront the homphobia and AIDS hysteria that exists.

is)

planning to do next? Maureen: We need a show of Our support on the streets to counteract the PRG and New Patriotic Movment so we're organising a rally and demonstration on May 2nd jointly with Haringey Black Action. We're also holding a public meeting on March 16th in Wood Green.

Jane: What next for the Project?

Maureen: We're looking to the Council to continue funding the Project, which I’m pretty optimistic about, to set up a base where young people can go and get advice, hold meetings, set up our own groups. We can’t let positive images just start and end in the schools.

If you are a young lesbian or gay man and want more detail abut the lesbian and gay youth event, contact. Maureen, Coleen, or Kyriacos on 881 300 ext. 3106,

“Positive Images'’ can be contacted c/o Reading Matters, Lymington Avenue, Wood Green, London N22

* Our Right to Decide! x

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 8

——— Building Briefing

TURN BACK THE GREY TIDE!

Bankers Order form for Labour Briefing 500 Club

Please complete every section of this form, and then return it to: Labour Briefing, c/o Jane Kelly, 26 Crof-

ton Rd, London SE5.

Bankers Order

. (bank name, sort code)

From:

(your address)

.... (your name)

My account number is:

Please debit from my account each. month the sum of £4, in favour of Labour Briefing No 2 account,Co-

operative Bank, Stratford E15, Code 08-90-76, Ac-

count No. 50349957.

Starting on

Thereafter On ..........6..2065

Signature ...... a

Dated.

Adate)

osneanll (date) of eachymonth

SUBSCRIBE TO BRIEFING

Make sure of your copy of the fortnightly Labour Briefing. For an annual subscription send £12 to Labour Briefing, 26 Crofton Road, London SE5 (cheques, etc., payable to Labour Briefing).

Briefing is a very easy paper to sell — why not take a few for your workplace, Labour Party or campaign. meetings?

Bulk orders of Briefing are available on sale or return (minimum order 5 copies).

I would like to be senti . . copies of Briefing on sale/return.

Name

Address ..

Send to 26 Crofton Road, London, SE5

ee ee ee

POSTAGE STAMPS

A new way of raising money for Briefing — painlessly! Save us your used postage stamps; and send them in with

your

paper money or bring them to the Steering

Committee. it won’t make us millions — but with your help we'll have ‘a nice little earner’’!

Threats to football

Dear Briefing,

Whilst watching the recent live game between Wimbledon and Everton (described by that obnoxious commentator, John Motson, as “the Bank of England visits the — corner shop”’), I thought it would be a good | idea to — compare Wimbeldon’s \ problems with their “‘owner"”, Sam Hamman, and our experience fighting the wilder excesses of Robert Maxwell at Oxford United.

Apart from anything else, | thought it was “illegal’” for one person/company to have a controlling interest in more than one Football League club. Ob* viously we have been overtaken by events in South London and L expect you've invited the London Football Supporters’ Association to contribute.

It is true that Oxford United wouldn’t be in the First Division without Robert Maxwell but he’s only interested in personal publicity and re-developing the Manor Ground. Before the “Thames | Valley Royals” fiasco, Maxwell manipulated the fans. into -helping»-him blackmail theCity Council (Andrew Smith called his bluff)-and he still periodically threatens to close the club or leave Oxford. The meteoric rise of Wimbledon F.C. (they were in the Southern

them ‘open. to. even greater capitalist exploitation and taken the footballers away from the community.

Maxwell's former manager, Jim Smith, and his new employers, Queen’s Park

pDooDoDoDoOoDoOoDooOooOoOoooOoOooo0o0oo00

We welcome letters on any subject — whether in reply to any of our articles or starting something new.

Write to Labour Briefing, 26 Crofton Road, London SE5.

Rangers, have been taken over by Marler Estates (whose influence spreads a lot further than South London), Fulham F.C., whose ground, Craven Cottage (good views of the Varsity Boat Race!), is also a prime development site, may disappear next season. Gordon Taylor, secretary of the Professional Footballers’ Association, has described it as ‘‘asset strippers vs the rest”? and called on Local Authorities to support their clubs (atone stage we tried to persuade the City Council to buy Oxford United). The sympathetic words of Hammersmith & Fulham council must be turned into community action. After all, it’s the fans who made the clubs — don’t let them die!

Andy Gibbons

Oxford

oooooo00000000

Whose anonymity?

Dear Mr or Ms,

Your article-on rape on:page 3 of your Feb 11-24th edition quite rightly. asks for “complete anonymity for rape victims’. Alongside it you print a photo of a’ person holding a banner naming a person who from the context is either the Ealing. victim or

Could you please justify your conduct? Or are you not keeping to the code you yourselves advocate?

Yours sincerely, Vivian Cook Colchester, Essex

poooogoooooooooooDo0o0000000000

Send snippets and info to Greg

Bassett, Labour Briefing,

Periscope Column, 26 Crofton

Road, London SE5.

eee

Mean time for sectarians

Sectarian leftists all over the country wil be staring in frustration at computer calculations of the electoral swing in Greenwich, Ir is not Deirdre Woods defeat that will disappoint them so much as the massacre of Kate Marshall.

Ears had pricked up in many a headbanging sect after the RCP won a surprising 600 votes in the Knowsley North by-election.

Could this small beginning really herald the. start of the longawaited mass break from the politics of social democracy?

No. The RCP vote was simply an angry backlash against Kinnock’s hamfisted imposition of Spitting Image reject George Howarth as candidate.

Sectarian dreams have been ruptured like cut-price condoms in the Greenwich by-election, where the laws of political gravity reasserted themselves.

Without Kinnock's help, the RCP candidate, General Secretary Kate Marshall, fared poorly. Her 91 votes — about the number that any named donkey might attract among incompetent voters — placed her bottom of the poll,

» another

trailing some 25% behind the Monster Raving Loony “‘Rainbow Alliance” candidate.

Will ultra-leftists still determined to avoid any real fight within’ the actual workers’ movement now decide to give the elbow to those feeble imitators, the RCP, and form a common front with the real Monster Raving Loonies?

Missionary Position

“Don't mess with the missionary man,"" is sound advice from the current Eurythmics hit single.

This warning should have come sooner for the Oxford woman student who was forced to battle through successive courts to uphold her right to an abortion, after being unfortunate enough to have sex with a closest nut. Obviously not a history student, he hadn't realised that the notion that women were the property of their menfolk, to do with as they pleased, had died out.

As a result of this case, yet ‘embarrassing. queston must be added to the catalogue of

interrogation necessary before hanky-panky-can safely take place in the Anxious Eighties.

a addition to the awkward, preliminary enquiries in regard to herpes, AIDS, chairmanship of the Tory Party, and stocks of condoms, a more detailed theological probing is now clearly necessary — to eliminate the risks carried by the more virulent varieties of skypilots and Bible-bashers

Even those carrying a current issue of Briefing, open at the Periscope column, cannot be taken as necessarily bona fide “right-on”” partners, since the paper may have been borrowed or even stolen as a deliberate cover by knowledgeable chauvinists.

For readers to weary to carry out the exhaustive pre-sex checks now required, the temptation to use a condom instead of a male

partner may well prove irresistable

As one former lay activist told Briefing:

“The advantage of masturbation is that you don’t have to talk to anyone — or fight any injunctions — afterwards.””

Currie-ing favour?

One journal for Yuppie wankers who don’t mind who they talk to before or afterwards is (Armchair) Marxism Today, never accused of excessive class consciousness.

The latest issue proudly boasts an interview with Edwina “Wholemeal” Currie, She was pleased to take advantage of this rare opportunity to obtain media coverage for her views!

Currie was quizzed by pseudofeminist hack» Bea Campbell, perhaps as a prelude to the latter's imminent leap from the Communist to the Tory Party, thus outdistancing ex-CP and current SDP careerist Sue Slipman.

We have been unable to confirm whether equally cosy armchair chats. with President Botha, Ayatollah Khomeini and other friends of the workers’ movement {and of women’s rights) such as expresident Marcos, Ted Rogers and Dusty Bin, are yet in the pipeline for Marxism Today’s less than discerning readers.

Heavens above!

From our ecclesiastical correspondent, Neil Down: Thank Christ for that!

Intensive lobbying by the Women's Action Committee at the General Synod has finally brought a vote in favour of the ordination of women priests.

At last, after all these years, the Church has decided to adopt a twentieth century approach to preaching its medieval dogma.

But arguing for sex equality with people who really believe that wafer biscuits are the flesh of a long-dead Jewish corpse remains an unrewarding task.

Even now the first women priests will not take office until 1991 at the earliest — representing a “‘gain'” for women’s rights about equal to the appointment of black policemen in the fight against racism

‘As with all doctrinal fights, this one was marked by repeated threats of a split in the dwindling ranks of the faithful.

‘As so often, it was the rabid reactionary ‘right — the Church equivalent of the SDP — that was threatening the split, while quaintly claiming in the words of the Archdeacon of Cheltenham that “The thought of a schism makes me sick at heart.""

The Bishop of London went further, effectively comparing the ordination of women to a dose of AIDS:

“Ie will be

in the Church’

bloodstream, and there will be no question of it being an experiment."

Former Tory Chair John Gummer was as sick as a parrot. He may have been prepared to work under a woman Prime Minister, but he draws the line at receiving communion from a woman priest. “That takes the biscuit,” he told Periscope; “I am incensed,””

RCP replies

Is DG, your Periscope correspondent (Briefing, no. 38), applying for diplomatic anonymity?

Kate Marshall, the RCP’s candidate in Greenwich, is married. She was also the only candidate who used her campaign to build the Wombourne 12 demo which I believe you support.

Unlike Deirdre, Kate didn’t have to tear up all her already bland publicity — “working for Greenwich” — to accommodate the vacuous “Deirdre Wood understands”. Kate didn’t have to change her hairstyle and clothes or pose for photographs on Observatory Hill, children in tow, doing an imitation of Ms Julie Andrews in “The Sound of Music”.

More seriously the idea of subjecting a candidate to the humiliation of explaining her family affairs to the gutter press is outrageous. Was the thought of a ghoulish sympathy vote more appealing than telling the News of the World to get lost?

But then it’s Neil’s party, and he'll do what he wants to. Will the real reactionary. still get your support?

Alan Harding RCP

Self-defence?

With hestitant moves towards renewed detente, why should US television choose this moment to screen Amerika, its anti-Soviet

mini-series featuring catatonic superbore Kris Kristofferson?

Currently. sitting on the Board of Directors of ABC, the TV network which produced Amerika are:

William Spencer, also a director of United Technologies ($3.9 billions in military contracts, 1985);

@M. Cabell Woodward, also vice chair of ITT ($1.5 billion);

@Frank Cary, also an IBM director ($1.8 billion);

@Alan Greenspan, whose Alcoa company produces much of the

aluminium used in Pentagon hardware.

Legal counsel and major shareholder for Capital Cities,

ABC's owners, is William Casey, recently retired CIA director

A fairly cut and dried case of ideology reflecting class interest.

Don’t listen to Briefing!

What should you do if you are a Labour Party member? Don't listen to us, for a start.

What authoritative source says so? None other than Deptford's absentee MP, John Silkin. In his annual report to Deptford CLP, he says membership of the Party means “thinking things through and discussing matters deeply, not taking your line from Briefing, City Limits or Militant or whatever magazine is in vogue.”

What a patronising attitude — does he really think that all his Party members do is go along and vote for things without thinking them through? We were going to print his attendance record at General Committee meetings, but we remembered what happened to Tribune.

Since we don’t want a costly legal battle, we'll just print his idea of who an MP skiould be accountable to — “above all to his or her conscience.” Nice one, John!

D.C.

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar I1th-24th 1987 page 9

Labour Party

For bold,

socialist policies!

I was born in Greenwich and brought up in Bermondsey, Both now have pseudo-Tory MPs under an Alliance banner. That sickens me.

We will never win byelections if we ight defensive campaigns. What are we frightened of?

What Greenwich had deci

was. obvious at

that’ someone d ona ‘damage limitation camapign, responding to the notion that the ‘wrong’ candidate had been selected.

In fact the candidate was a good candidate. The problem was that because of a fear held by some people in the Party a defensive campaign was fought and the issues were never put across in a positive way, in ‘order to expose the Alliance and Tory positions.

Of course many people in the higher reaches of the Party expressed support for the candidate. Unfortunately these same people did not have the courage of their convictions.

Who decided to call the byelection on February 26th, instead of the same day as the Truro. by-election? In a panic over the selection of the candidate in Greenwich, it was decided, presumably by the leader of the Party's office, that a short campaign would ‘be

better. pate tisaale “But the Alliance would not have been half as effective if the iwo by-elections had been on the same, day. Their resources would have been stretched, and they would have had to concentrate their main effort on holding Truro.

The media-induced fear over the selection of Deirdre Wood prompted a gross __ panic misjudgement by _ those responsible for the timing of the by-election. In effect, despite their protestations, they showed that they already accepted such attacks as were subsequently made on the candidate as legitimate.

By John Wilton

Labour Prospective Parliamentary Candidate Birmingham Edgbaston Constituency

There are people in this Party whose main criterion is whether of not the media say the public will accept certain policies and certain candidates. Consequently we accept the label “hard left’: as being something akin to the AIDS plague. The media, the Tories, the Alliance, and the Establishment have, of couse, a vested interest in portraying the “hard left’ as vote losers.

“Hard Left’”’

Tactical voting by the Conservatives in Greenwich though was not to stop the “hard left”” candidate, it was to stop the Labour Party, Would the Tories who voted SDP to stop us winning not still have done so if a different ‘soft left” or even a right wing candidate had been selected? Those Conservatives have no sympathy for the Labour Party, all they wanted to do was to stop the Labour Party winning.

‘We saw such tactical voting in Newcastle-Under-Lyme _ nearly defeat the Labour candidate, who could hardly be called

The Alliance tactical’ vyote the Labour candidate is, and from whatever wing of the Party they are, especially if we fight a defensive campaign, the Alliance candidate is in anyway credible, and the Tory candidate is abysmal.

We will not win the electorate over by arguing that we are not really what the press label us, and that we are all really “cuddly”. We have to win the argument by pointing out that “shard left!” means being willing to attack privilege, means wanting jobs for those who need them, means wanting decent housing, decent education for all, and a decent Health Service.

Labour Party press conference, Greenwich. Left to right: Frank Dobson MP, Deirdre Wood (candidate), Giles Radice MP.

Stop apologising!

We have to convince people that ‘hard left’ means wanting a fair and equal society for everyone, a society without any discrimination, racial, sexual or otherwise. This: is the sort of campaign Tony Benn ran in Chesterfield -— and won convincingly.

if you start any campaign in effect apologising for your candidate. by” manoeuvring behind the scenes to. achieve some kind of ‘tdamage limitation”, you _merely undermine your campaign from the start, *

1 doubt if those in control of the Party machine can accept this argument, especially with their eyes permanently fixed on the media’s reaction, and their judgement influenced by the media’s views.

However, | suggest at the very least it is a lesson the ‘hard left’’ has to learn. If we are ever going to change public opinion and win by-elections and elections with so-called ‘thard left” candidates, we have to argue for our beliefs, policies and principles and convince the public that it is we who have their best interests at heart. Until we start doing this positively, and stop apologising, we will never change anything.

Birmingham Witch-hunt

Support Selly Oak

Once again, the Labour Party NEC, has shown itself more interested in causing time-wasting and within the Party concentrating its fire on the Tories and the Alliance.

It ruled that I was not a member of Selly Oak CLP at its January meeting.

In 1983 several socialists,

including myself, were excluded from Yardley CLP, Birmingham, even though we were longstanding members transferring from other CLPS.

The argument at the time was that there is no such thing as automatic transfer rights when you move house — you join a constituency rather than the party as a whole, Therefore Yardley were within their rights to accept or reject whom they wanted.

We understand that a regional enquiry, set up after the five of us appealed to the NEC, unanimously rejected the

By Bob Whitehead a personal capacity)

charges and recommended that our membership be accepted. | say ‘‘understand’”’ because although we saw a leaked copy of the report, and our version of events has been confirmed independently, the crucial regional report never got to the NEC.

After a 9 month delay, the NEC rediscussed the matter,and in the absence of the report narrowly ruled against our membership of Yardley.

Four of the original five are still living in, and still excluded from, Yardley CLP. But, for the last two years I have been living in nearby Selly Oak. This constituency took me into membership and | have acted as a branch secretary, branch EC member, GC delegate, CLP EC member, Political Education Officer for my branch and... a delegate to the Birmingham District Labour Party.

At my first DLP meeting nearly a year ago, Yardley delegates complained about my

presence, and when they got no joy, complained to the NEC.

The NEC said that to put the situation in order, Selly Oak merely had to write requesting my membership be endorsed. In the current context of witchhunts and expulsions Selly Oak were loath to, do this, and anyway, if Yardley can accept who. it wants, why not Selly Oak?

The right’ wing in Birmingham organised a boycott of four CLPs from the

DLP, declaring the __leftdominated DLP “unconstitutional”.

A national offi was.

dispatched to Birmingham, and discussed informally with the officers of Selly Oak CLP. She left saying that if Selly Oak and myself wrote to. the NEC requesting endorsement of iny membership at. the December meeting, she was sure that it

would "be, dealt with “favourably”? Despite my doubts, this

procedure was followed, as it seemed that an important victory was within our grasp. Lo and behold, it’ never got

This is an extract from a speech by Eric Heffer at a Campaign public meeting in Bristol on February 27th.

There can be no disguising the fact that the loss of Greenwich is a setback for

Labour.

Labour ‘should — have won, and therefore there are lessons to be learned:

We must have clear distinctive socialist policies. If we seek to appear little different from the SDP then it is they who gain, not Labour.

Dr Owen has said that Labour suffers. from its deep ideological nature. He is wrong. It is precisely clear bold socialist policies that are needed, which in real terms are the only ones which can begin to deal with Britain's crisis due to the present economic system, aggravated by Thatcher's policies.

If Labour appears to be back-tracking and is not for-

discussed at the December NEC; but the January NEC... voted heavily . against my membership! (What would “‘unfavourable"’ treatment have been like?)

Selly Oak is extremely. upset by. the constantly shifting grounds for my exclusion, by the lack of charges or fresh evidence, and by the lack of justice “and democracy in resolving this dispute. it has now resolved'to, declare its wish to have me as a member and the GC has set up a campaign body which will accept delegates from other CLPs to campaign for my membership rights to be properly endorsed.

The CLP has.sent a letter to other Birmingham — CLPs defending my. record as an officer and a member and defending absolutely my right to support. Labour. Briefing — although it does not agree with my views!

Will Selly Oak stick to its guns? The signs are good, but our chances of success also depend on support from other CLPs in the area and all socialists in the Party.

thright, clear and bold, then voters begin to believe that we are purely opportunist rather

people, to be seen on the streets with them speaking and canvassing and we must

than determined to change things on their behalf.

It is not left wing candidates that lose elections. When Tony Benn fought Chesterfield, it was said then that a left wing candidate. would lose, yet Tony put up Labour's vote, winning back votes lost in the 1983 General Election.

What.does Greenwich mean

stop being mesmerised by the TV and the press. Our candidates are inhibited if they are packaged like soap powder.

They should express themselves amongst the people without so-called “minders’’.

In. simple. terms, Labour must say what it stands for and what we intend to do.

for Labour?

@The campaign, _ suggesting that the Party is riddled wi so-called ‘hard left loonies’’ was a gift to a hostile press and to our political opponents, It has caused uncertainty amongst the Labour electorate. What is really required is unity around policies to overcome what Thatcher has done.

@We cannot win by TV packaging and by being afraid

We must expose and attack the vicious nature. of this capitalist, selfish, Thatcherite society and say clearly how we intend to change it. Labour must not be ashamed of its socialist past and policies: It was ,clear socialist policies which gave us victories in 1945, 1964 and 1974,

We must.not turn in ‘on ourselves. That could be disastrous. We must go for. ward to win the next election

of our shadows and with our With. firm. bold _ positive candidates put on the defen- Policies and be outward sive. Our candidates need to |00king.

be free to get out amongst the It is the only way to win.

Labour Party Black Sections statement

Police attacks on the Black Community

The Labour Party Black Section is appalled at the sharp increase in police violence against the Black community.

The list of maimings and killings has been added to in the case of Trevor Monerville and with the death of Clinton McCurbin in Wolverhampton. Raids on our community, like the ones in Brixton, Handsworth and St Pauls, based on the racist pretext of “looking for drugs’’, are an attempt to criminalise Black People.

We are committed to throwing our full weight behind the campaigns for justice in the face of these police attacks. If the state and its bully boys in blue are incapable or unwilling to protect us then we must defend ourselves by whatever means necessary.

The police have proved that they are not even accountable to their Tory masters. We reaffirm our demand that they must be placed under the democratic control of the whole community.

For more information, contact: Chris Khamis, LPBS West Midlands Organiser, 021 551 7636, or Steve Jomoa, National Youth Organiser, 015775057.

PHOTO: Jez Coulson (IFL)

eras

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 10

Birmingham ‘Labour Briefing

Birmingham has always been a bastion of old right-wing Labourism.

The left may have made progress in comparably large cities like Sheffield and Manchester, but in Birmingha! the City Council Labour Group is stil in the grip of the right wing.

In the past year that right wing control has openly. floutted party democracy. On many occasions it has ignored and over-ruled the policy of Birmingham District Labour Party. So, despite DLP opposition, we are to have a £130m Convention Centre, and we have had a £400,000 loss making Road Race and a £2%m_ (officially! = — unofficially it is probably a lot more) Olympic bid.

These prestige projects have been embarked upon at the expense of the social needs of the people in Birmingham. Even the local election manifesto last May was drawn up and launched by the right on the

Labour group without any agreement with the District Party.

At the end_of last year the left in Birmingham showed signs of attempting to fight back. An attempt was made to organise around a group of Birmingham Labour Councillors on the left. They came together to work for more democracy within the Labour group and for the full implementation of Birmingham Labour Party policy. This left group — _ given the title Summerfield Group —_ was subsequently extended into the wider Party.

The formation of the Summerfield Group met a hostile response from the local press. Right wing Councillors, including «the Council leader, were daily bleating in the papers about unity and democracy in General Election year. (I suppose it is a step forward that they acknowledge the existence of the word democracy, even if they do not know what it means,

Besides running to the press the right wing reacted in its usual traditional vicious manner by removing a black councillor, who was instrumental in the formation of the Summerfield Group, from Vice Chair of the Equal Opportunities Committee.

“that the Summerfield

THE “LEFT” IN BIRMINGHAM

But problems were to occur within sections of the left in Birmingham. The right wing Labour councillors were allowed to continue to set the agenda and take the initiativ leaving the left to react to their actions and accusations.

For example, what was supposed to be the initial launch meeting of the wider Summerfield Group was unfortunately cancelled at the last. -minute~-amid — much confusion, Apparently the then Convenor cancelled the launch arbitrarily as he believed it was not a good time to hold it given the weight of adverse (right

wing Labour councillor inspired) press. and media publicity.

By John Wilton Labour Prospective Parliamentary Candidate

Birmingham Edgbaston Constituency

The official launch of the Summerfield Group was. eventually held on January 17th. By then the right had organised another little trick, taken the offensive, _ and exposed some of the “‘cold feet” of the soft left (which they prompily shot themselves in!)

At a meeting of the Labour Group a few days before the launch, the right wing proposed to remove Labour councillors who supported Summerfield from Chairs of Committees. After much debate, and an initial 31-31 tied vote, Dick Knowles, Council leader, stated

‘supporters should not be removed as Chairs provided they signed a “loyalty oath” type pledge to the Labour group, proclaiming unity and ~"~denor Summerfield. - Unfortunately five Labour councillors who were supporters of Summerfield signed the pledge, and did not attend the official Summerfield launch meeting.

One of the principles of the Summerfield Group, is the pursuit. of accountability. If Summerfield is to function as a caucus it’ must__ itself demonstrate internal accountability. Two questions therefore have to. be. asked. First, who decided the first Taunch should be cancelled because of adverse publicity? Secondly, and much more importantly, who decided the five councillors should sign the loyalty pledge? Have we already got a group within a group? The

five should, in my opinion, have attended the offical launch: not 50 they could be attacked for their actions in signing (though 1 believe they were wrong to do so) but so that they could be open to, and hear, the arguments from their comrades, both for and against signing.

I know people will say they were right to sign for all sorts of, tactical reasons. However,] feel they are wrong. To put bluntly they do. not know their ‘own strength.

Changing Birmingham City Council is about getting existing policy implemented, developing new socialist policy, getting that adopted and implemented and getting representatives elected who will be accountable to the District Party and carry out Party policy.

The first two are pointless without the third. Without accountable representatives we are wasting our time.

The initial Labour Group vote on the removal of the Summerfield supporters from Chairs of Committees was tied at 31 to 31. This, 1. would Suggest, is an. indication of changes occurring within the Group. Some people on the “‘soft-left’” are having their eyes opened as they experience the venom of the right wing. They are seeing for themselves that you cannot’ persuade and convince some people — they are beyond persuasion.

As someone stated at the Summerfield launch, those people on the *‘soft left’’ under attack from the right wing need ‘our sympathy and our help.

Yes, I agree, they do. We need to help them learn from their own experience who their friends are. and when they should not let those friends down. If you sit on the fence too long hoping to persuade people ‘on the right, you merely end up with marks on your bum, from the fence posts and from it being kicked by the right.

One of the arguments at the Summerfield launch was that signing Dick Knowles’ loyalty pledge was a tactical retreat. According to my dictionary retreat. means ‘‘go back, or relinquish a position”’. This is a bit like saying Labour's defeat in 1979 was a tactical retreat — we gave Thatcher what she wanted,

Victories are never won, or change achieved, by tactical retreats. Tactical _ retreats usually mean diluting your objectives. Remove the compromise “tactical retreat"

Phil Murphy (centre): removed as Vice Chair of the Equal Opportunities Committee by the Right.

policy, and those on the fence have to choose — right or left.

The left has to call Knowles’ bluff and stand firm. The pledges mustbe torn up. The left is im the ascendency in Birmingham, not the old failed rightwing. We are being proved right about policy commitments being chucked out of the indow (nationally and locally). The right are scared of us. They are scared of us “rocking the boat"; scared of us standing together — which is why. the) have used the press to frighten” us with electoral blackmail. It is why they have used tactics like pledges to attempt to divide us.

Yes, we have to sympathise with and help those whom the press label the soft left. But we have to show them that we can win by standing firm on our principles. Every time people on the left take decisions without being accountable, like calling off meetings or signing loyalty pledges, thcy concede the initiative and the agenda to the right wing, We need to fight on our agenda.

The strength of the left in Birmingham is not in the Labour Group, it is in the branches and constituencies, and in the District Party among

rank “and file members. So removing people . from Committee Chairs, which they only hold with the acquiescence of the right, will not weaken the strength of the lett.

Instead = of making concessions like signing pledges to keep Chairs of Committees, the left should be using these actions by the right wing to illustrate to those who have any doubts on the soft left the strategy required to change the Labour Group. The strength of

draw concessions from them in the Labour Group, like token

Chairs of Committces. Our strength © isin policy development, with organising to replace failed

personnel in the Labour Group with accountable representatives,

The Summerfield Group in Brimingham needs to push policy development and push socialist - policies, but at the same time not concede the agenda to, or be diverted by, the tactics of the right wing in the Labour Group. All members of the left.nged to be aware of this. This means people representing the left remembering where

theif. cormades. and political friends and being accountable to them, It means not signing pledges in. the Labour G

ps on the left like Summerfield not being hung-up, hindered. or facing political-hiccups. (called tactical retreats) caused by. ity, own

supporters in the Labour Group™

giving the right wing in that group a stick to beat the left with by allowing their divisive

tactics to -succeeed. If that

Hie Sek nara uerrpennrmerrmmen tem avin it-hay 40 be pA cree ere

the left are the right people for

the job. Overall it means getting committed, accountable representatives. in place in

overall control of the Labour group in Birmingham in order to implement a whole range of socialist polivies that change people’s lives in Birmingham. It also requires a committed rank and file grouping __ like Summerfield which can give the strength of argument required

to those accountable representatives to help them withstand the malicious

onslaught of the right.

Scottish Labour Briefing

Labour and the

Scottish Assembly

The Glasgow Herald call it the ‘“Doomsday’’ scenario.

If the next general election sees Labour increasing its majority of seats in Scotland for the third time runing, yet still cannot form a government in Westminster, for how much longer can it command the allegiance of the Scottish working class?

For many people in Scotland, this..is Labour's last chance. If they can’t get

By J. Niblock Glasgow Central CLP

into power, why waste a vote ‘on them?

The SNP election slogan — “I's time to play the Scottish card’’ — is essentially aimed at the post-election situation, when they expect to grow rapidly at the expense of the Labour Party.

The SNP base their politics on the assumption that Labour will not be able to reflect or defend the interests and needs of

the Scottish working class Looking back over the last eight years, it seems a sound assumption, Scottish Labour MPs have been brushed repeatedly aside by Thatcher; Younger and Rifkind, despite the continuing erosion of Tory support in Scotland.

A third Thatcher victory followed by further ineffectual Labour lobbying will turn much of the Scottish workng class towards the SNP, and thereby undermine Labour's chances of ever being the majority party at Westminster.

Kinnack was asked on Scottish television if Labour should forge ahead with the Assembly campaign, even if the Tories win the election. His answer was no — an Assembly must await a future Labour government.

This advice will be disastrous for the Labour Party not only in Scotland, but throughout Britain.

For Labour to represent the inter*sts of the Scottish working class it, must take the lead in campaigning for a Scottish Assembly, regardless of the outcome of the next election.

Labour Briefing Day School

Socialism and Nationalism Speakers include: Denis Canavan, MP Marion Davies George Kerevan Gunter Minnerup Jim Young Saturday April 4th 10am-6pm City Halls, Albion Street, Glasgow

Workshops

Creche

£3 waged, £1 unwaged Contact Gordon Morgan, 39 Regent Park Square, Glasgow G41 The majority of Scottish people want an Assembly. All Scottish parties except the Tories support an Assembly. % How can we ensure an Assembly is established after the Election? %* How should the labour movement organise to lead the ‘Assembly Campaign? % What should be the attitude of Socialists towards the National Question? With ‘the approach of an Election the above questions are urgently posed. The Labour Briefing Day School will provide activists with a forum for debate.

Labour Briefing No. 39 Mar 11th-24th 1987 page 11

International Briefing

Gorbachev opts for old power balance

Soviet General Secretary Gorbachev's announcement that the Soviet Government is ready to accept the ‘‘zero option’’ on medium range missiles in Europe represents “an attempt to return to the

old notion of equal security “for the two super-powers.

For most of the post-war period, the Soviets were able to feel seciire that they could protect Soviet territory from the worst effects of a war in

Europe, Their military planning involved “the idea: that in

response toa nuclear strike from the US against the USSR, the Soviet Warsaw Pact could retaliate by overrunning Western Europe. Their notion of equal security for the two super-powers meant that they would maintain dominance in European forces, while the USA would not be directly threatened on the American continent by Soviet missiles.

Against thiy background, the Soviet modernisation of their medium rat missiles in Europe in the 1970s — the in-

By Oliver MacDonald

troduction of the SS20s — was seen by the Soviet military (and NATO military commanders at the time) as a routine affair without impact on the strategic balarice. :

The arrival of Cruise and especially of Pershing missiles in Western Europe presented a direct challenge to the concept ‘of “equal security”” by presenting a stragetic threat to-Soviet territory trom Western Europe This was unaccceptable to the Soviet leadership and provoked the greatest tension between the superpowers for a couple of decades.

Gromyko, the Soviets were equally not prepared to accept the illegitimacy of the $520 deployment for that could deny their “legal’” right to dominance in the European theatre.

The Gorbachev initiative shows he is more concerned with Soviet security than with face. The question now is whether the NATO military leadership in Europe is willing to abandon the rea} purpose of Cruise and Pershing which was not to balance the $S-20s but 16, pose a military threat directly to the USSR from Western Europe along with Airland Battle tactics and FOFA,

The German state leadership,

But under

National CND —

Demonstration April 25

1987

Details to be announced

ee ee

Socialist Po

ies for a Labour victory!

Conference organised by Labour Briefing

Sat/Sun March 28th/29th

Lambeth Town Hall, ‘Brixton

Speakers include: Eric Heffer MP; Jeremy Corbyn MP; Mildred Gordon PPC; Joy Hurcombe PPC & Chair Labour CND; Nadine Finch, Chair LCI; Narendra

Makanji, Secretary Labour Party Black Sections; John Paimer,. Socialist Society; —

Workshops on International, Policy, Economic Strategy and Social Policy. International workshops include: @ getting Britain out of Ireland (Nadine

Finch); @NATO/Warsaw Pact & Non-alignment (J. Corbyn); @Racism & British

imperialism (A. Patel & J. Boumelha); @Breaking links with Apartheid.

Films, food, creche, social — registration from 10.30 each day.

Cost £2.50 for weekend, £1.50 per day (half price unwaged)

Register now! Write to Briefing, 51 Musgrove Road, London SE14.

An independent voice of

particularly on the Right, will also be upset because it had hoped to pursue a. more muscular policy towards. the East behind the Cruise-Pershing shield. The main, beneficiaries of the deal in power-politics. terms will be the French and British states, provided they can push through theiF’ttucleat rearmamient programmes, especially Trident.

For the peoples of both halves of the continent the zero option will bea real gain, on two conditions: the first is that an agreement leads to a return to detente across the continént; the second. is that the campaign against Star Wars is stepped’ up, for the testing and deployment of Star Wars would negate any gains from a European agreement.

Defeat?

For those who see the debate between multilateralists _ and. unilateralists as one about the best tactics for making disarmament deals with the Soviets, an agreement on the zero option might seem like a “defeat” for unilateralism, This is a cheap debating point. The unilateralist case is a above all one of principle: the West’s nuclear arsenal is not there to deter a non-existent Soviet military threat. It is there to terrorise the peoples of the world and threaten. the USSR,

General Roger's replacement as NATO Commander-in-Chief spelt this point out the other day, when he said that the Soviet threat is not of military invasion but of political subversion, In a warped way, this is right, or should be; a genuine political democratisation in the USSR would demonstrate to working people in Western Europe that there is a. better type of state and society than capitalism. The Reaganites’ Star Wars drive and their entire policy towards the USSR has been geared to sabotaging such change in the USSR.

When Thatcher goes to Moscow she should be harassed by the Labour Party to come out unequivocally against Star Wars to take a definite stand in favour of detente. And she should be forced to come clean on her readiness to negotiate Trident away with Gorbachev

South African labour

For 13 years, despite intense harassment from the apartheid regime, the South Africa Labour Bulletin has championed the cause of the non-racial trade union movement.

With the independent Labour Monitoring Group, it has provided both a record of activity and a forum for discussion for the revival of working class action.

STEVE POTTER spoke to JON LEWIS, one of SALB’s editors and a participant in the LMG, during his recent visit to Britain.

The birth of SALB coincided with the revival of trade union action in South Africa after the long years of repression in the 1960s.

The first issue appeared in 1974 immediately after the big wave of strikes in the

Durban area when tens of thousands of black workers came out in support of wage demands.

The organisations formed out of that movement combined with those in South Natal formed the Institute for Industrial Education. Part of the function of that body was to bring out SALB on a regular basis,

How has the bulletin coped with the recent repression?

Jon stressed: “We believed that it was important that the journal continued to be published legally, in order to continue

«the kind of work it does. Under

eo The South Africa Labour

Bulletin is produced eight times a year. For details of subscriptions, etc., write to: PO Box 31073, Braamfontein 2017, South Africa

phone: (011) 339 8133

The Labour Monitoring Group can be contacted at the same address.

the emergency regulations one is not allowed to comment on the conduct of the security forces, for example, But we have continued to record the struggles of the labour movement as in the past.”

While the journal has managed to stay in publication its staff have been harassed. ‘In the Eastern Cape, Andre Roux has been detained. Andre is an active. member of the United Democratic Front there. More recently one of our Johannesburg editors, Phil Bonner, has been expelled from the country. Another editor has gone into hiding.”

The Labour — Monitoring Group has also played a role in the response to the emergency. It was started in 1984 just before the Transvaal stay-away (general strike).

Jon explains, ““The stay-away marked a major landmark in terms of trade union politicisation, particularly in terms of alliances with forces like students. It was the most major trade union action since the 1950s. We wanted to really try

and see what was going on. The Transvaal of course is where three quarters of industry is.

“It was a major undertaking. We wanted to make sure that whatever did happen was recorded. We collected a group of people together and simply phoned up all the factories. In the process we were able to record the figures for the stayaway, We also were able to talk to the organisations that prepared the action.

“We collected the pamphlets and documents so that we had a record of the moves that led up to the strikes. We were also able to: show that in those communities where trade union and student organisation were the strongest, the stay-away achieved almost 100%. success. We have done the same with most trade union action since.

“Since the Emergency the role of the LMG has changed somewhat. We decided to keep a list of all detained trade unionists and we hope this has been useful in building solidarity. We have also kept a record of workers’ responses to the

British Army on the streets of Belfast

Troops Out!

Labour Committee

Ireland

Annual General Meeting April 4th-5th . Manchester Town Hall

Contact the Labour Committee on Ireland and Labour Women for Ireland at:

SPECIAL EDITION ON INFLUX CONTROL POLICY

FCI NCAR Foundatio

rom Black Sash

SA Urbani:

aw struggles in Crossroads

‘derly urbanisation’

emergency. A survey of how companies were treating the families of those detained (were they continuing to pay wages?) was another important a since the unions themselves still do not have the resources to carry out this work.”

BM Box 5355, London WC1N 3XX

The work carried out by the Bulletin and the LMG has been a part of the revival of working class activity in'the last decade. For those outside South Africa it remains one of the best sources of information and debate. It deserves our support.

Red and Green

The closure of an ageing coalfired power station on the edge of Brighton is hardly likely to inspire national interest.

Yet the local campaign to save Brighton B (also known as Shoreham Power Station) has put the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) on the defensive and attracted the support of Shadow Energy Minister Stan Orme.

Over the last decade the CEGB has closed some

plant being ready in time to meet the predicted rise in demand. The CEGB hopes to fall back on increased output from the AGR plants, on keeping the ageing Magnox nucler reactors running and on greater use of existing oil fired plant.

All of these options are fraught with problems — unreliable AGRs have an appalling record when it comes to producing electricity; the price of oil is expected to rise rapidly again during the next decade; the Magnox reactors are old and

By Andy Porter

decades of __ pro-nuclear policies have created an institutional structure that aids nuclear power as a matter of course. The head of the CEGB — Lord Walter Marshall — was put there by Thatcher to promote the PWR and nuclear power in general.

The impact of Marshall's nuclear empire on the Brighton area will be the immediate loss of 300 jobs at the power station, plus an estimated 1,000 knock-on jobs in the local economy. Coal for the station comes from the North East and an estimated 600 mining jobs could be lost

The devastation of Britain's economy over the last decade

200 similar stations — SERA

always arguing that has been achieved through refurbishment is too dangerous and should be thousands of *‘minor’’ expensive and closed down. ea oak ooo unnecessary. In this context Shoreham left and the “‘utopian’’ greens

A more likely explanation is that this policy is a deliberate strategy to make nuclear

Power Station is a_ vital resource — 300 megawatts of generating capacity immediately available for

that have the sensible alternatives. Rational planning based on

er __essential to vinrantaaedl ‘iectricity another decade for the cost of environmental, economic and supply. a refurbishment that will be oll gies vigge 4 i less than £20 million. Sizewell joreham ower ation Closing stations _—_—ilike open. Imaginative use of

Shoreham has left us dependent on existing nuclear reactors and —_nuclear electricity imported from France.

reactors, starting with a PWR at Sizewell,

will eventually provide four times the capacity, but at 100 times the cost — not to mention the danger.

In the long run Shoreham is suited to conversion to

The CEGB, however, seem intent on demolishing the site and paying the Port Authority

existing technology would create jobs, consume energy, and establish a more decentralised and democratic energy economy.

In. Brighton @ campaign

your area. They are one of the more powerful and reactionary institutions in the country.

Having pursued 108 combined heat and. power, bs r licy the CEGB ! f Sesto edting’on about an modernisation and fitting out I linking trade unionists, expected shortage of supply in. With the desulphurisation & environmentalists and the the mid-1970s. Their solution, technology that. eliminates § Labour Party has at least put OT ee” cis a new!" 2over 90%, at Seid cain 2 the CEGB decision up for rogtahe of nuclear Producing sulphur emissions. € scrutiny. The CEGB are prog S pursuing similar policies in

Es

Ironically, however, the CEGB may be caught short by

to take it off their hands.

Why not take them on before

its own policies. There is little Regional management don’t ek eae it’s too late? chance of the Sizewell PWRor even have to get into the Labour’s Shadow Energy Minister, Stan Orme, a key supporter of the Ce is Bris

: bour’s SI Energy * ; (por t hton B. any other newly built power nuclear power debate; How far will he resist the pro-nuclear lobby? sa of the Campaign to Save Brighton B.

ee ee a ee ee a ee

Published by Labour Briefing, 26 Crofton Road, London SE5< Printed by MPS (TU), Acre Lane; London SW2.

sn) ¢ esaseeg gs 2 ny 259385932 083 Sao g25283'82 5 az eagcgcxs oo 20 s . B3g3 2522278 x55 SeGeRReo € 2. Sos lag ge > =F oO. Soo as £ th OS — SQ S28 FOL BSG iN ; 35 eS 0R°R So J0Cee $ Sees roe oa” S2e339% Seg Os 7 ee aS _8< FelSs = B59 es § 8ragteecs SE2F8cems sioF Fir67e~< | 20 a 2? SS5a% a5 = ge 2s? = o gs §28cessSe_.-so*Ske gas es. $32. 72 (35 = tao oe 20n ge FS _FO5B o83,.08 3 SF 188 eee notes esse°agssss% “S*sOSs ao3 eee o. SeaegeR" 3.08 233352 -ax28 358 de goete S2bS553598 S055 .5 253.9835 55 SSS2 800° Dseasss22 ir ey aio > Se F324c08° FSRSesa> FoSsass SRssasassss PHOTOS: Stefano Cagnoni (Report) = = osae> g2esseagnal £2238 3 283553823833 8883 ooSe S53 sare?3 eseig. 2228 38foog 2S S BeGgvac~s < aS @¢28535_0 Sszc8. ca°ss 336 2 acs = > ( ms 88os°S a2098 33 - S8tcc, 833 833 8Ss52F 5985%9e59 an sting. 53883. 5°8 Sa7S" 4 a5a7s =? eentes B8oasss ee Bezs88 gotssrass§ eo ee ca cols Tas $2o2eo Fagen S554 S8ekso Fras 2 ns83 moses ei rr Ssvrgs sp veyed aeoana<S|e< iso 8a eeCsoORI A oIeae oS sass el Ss Slo sos S2ua7 = B09 6ag$° a |e eigss3 eas eg 3 eS 3328 3a5 8 1oklasze 3 a ea 3a2F 252 creis 3 2853378 | SSlagect 300 S o* oe. 3 ee ee Eee Sao .298 asge 3:58 gee . qaeesae In 8 * s 3359533 sie * aeace3 3328 3833380 jase LN SesoSasescsts 35 rr 35325388" 33 538) ge astare gaee 888383 8028" 85 BS ome 393333" 3.9%: goh3°S pr sg 33% F223 902005312 “8 3° ogee ssi 3377 eae s9g°s 6 Ey ile ee a Sse ge. Shes. Ce gigosse7osse 82 | age e zz 8388 BS | 22° 532. 80388 =% Pee ee Pareto ae Ol ee "os woeroes BF ace weet otecSego > i sakeosssseee of