The Socialist Party never condemned the UCS workers. Quite the reverse. It was heartening to see a group of workers refusing to passively accept the sack. At least they didn’t meekly accept their fate or rely solely on appeals to Labourite and trade union leaders to save them. They took positive action on their own account.
We wished them luck in using their bargaining strength to get the best of redundancy terms they could.
The Socialist Party has always given its general support to the industrial side of the class struggle while leaving the specific tactics to be adopted in this struggle to the workers immediately involved. If after considering the situation carefully the UCS workers democratically decided on a peaceful, disciplined “work-in” that was up to them.
The Socialist Party will continue to urge workers everywhere to resist attacks made on their living standards by their employers. This is a basic necessity so long as capitalism lasts. At the same time, we recognise such action to be purely defensive, besides never-ending, and which still leaves the factories, mines, shipyards, land, transportation systems, and the other places where wealth is produced, in the hands of the owning class. We, therefore, have organised politically to work to bring nearer the day when capitalism’s inhumanity, waste and chaos will be swept away by the democratic action of the majority of the world’s working class.
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