Reformism - On the right track?

The immediate goal of reformists is legislative palliatives . The immediate goal of the Socialist Party is the social revolution. We rebel against capitalist society not in the name of abstract principles of justice or equality but for the effective emancipation of humanity where workers will take possession of the means of life without paying tribute and without serving anyone. We believe that the organisation of society should be from the bottom up and that workers must organise it themselves. The workers have no need of chiefs and are quite capable of delegating one of their own with a particular task.


Reformism is the politics of here and now, of concessions and compromise, of collaboration and accommodation. As the politics of here and now, reformism shapes those who pursue it, it shapes their organisations, and shapes their relations with the working class. People place their hope in their representatives in Parliament. They believe that hoped-for successes require only their representatives to make use of the appropriate means. Those good people who earnestly wish to remove the inconveniences and injustices of our present social state, also wish even a little more earnestly to preserve the cause of these inconveniences

Our criticism of reformism is quite simple. No worker gives up the struggle for immediate reforms, and for as many reforms to be gained as possible. But reformists substitute reforms for revolution. Reforms, whatever their number, never lead to a transformation of the system. For if a reform threatens the basis of the system, the ruling class would put forward such resistance to it, that a revolution is unavoidable.

Often the promised fruits of reforms will not be realised and that, even if realised, they frequently improve the lot of one category of workers at the expense of the others. What will be gained by some will be lost by others. A redistribution of poverty.

There are also reforms and there are reforms. Those which the ruling class bring about in order to improve and make more efficient the running of the capitalist system. The capitalists, if they are clear-sighted, consent to better the lot of the workers in order to keep them under control and in subjection. And those the proletariat extort through struggle, by the power of organisation and the effectiveness of action. Workers, although demanding amelioration of their prison-like conditions, ought above all to strive to force the doors of the capitalist prison. In any case, one has no right, for the sake of one or two palliatives to make the proletariat forget its captivity.

To reformists “constructive” parliamentary work is of supreme importance as it constitutes in their eyes the gradual introduction of socialism. A reform here and a reform there, and the prospect of “socialism” has become nearer than it was. They do not perceive that the reforms have not challenged the basic interests of capitalists, and even as palliatives their value, in comparison with the needs, are frequently often insignificant .

We are no longer in an era of positive achievements of social reforms but a period of economic crisis. Reformists fail to recognise that the yielding attitude of the ruling classes is itself an elastic thing which develops a power of resistance proportionate to the pressure brought upon it; the more you squeeze out of the bourgeoisie, the more restive it becomes, and when the pressure reaches a certain limit it throws you back with a terrific force. What has been gained, suddenly is lost.

To-day, we possess, sufficient means of production to satisfy all reasonable needs, i.e., to provide well-being to all. There will no longer be any need , as is the case today, for men and women to be condemned to long days of drudgery, to stupefying fatigue. Work is life and also the bond that unites people in society. Solidarity cannot be decreed by a law, only by public opinion. There will be a simple relation of reciprocity.

The Unions and Political Parties

The Socialist Party claims that the wealth of society is created by the workers. The working class alone does the world’s work, has created its wealth, constructed its mills and factories, made its roads, laid its rails, spanned the rivers with bridges and tunnelled through mountains. The workers alone by the labour of their brawn or the effort of their brains are essential to society.


The Socialist Party claims that the workers, through their work-place committees, industrial unions, and federated communes or whatever other means of decision-making and administration society chooses to use, will organise and control all the processes of wealth production. The Socialist Party carry the struggle to achieve this on the political field in order to challenge the power which the present ruling class wields through its domination of the State which it wins at the ballot box. By its victory at the ballot box, and its consequent political domination, the capitalists are able to subjugate labour. We cannot leave political control in the hands of the ruling class. We have seen what power the conquest of the State gives to the capitalist in its struggleagainst the working class. It is through its political strength that the capitalists can deprive us of civil liberties the loss of which can make the peaceful advocation for the revolution impossible. The maintenance of civil liberty is part of the political struggle. The ruling class can resort to the use of the armed forces and other violent methods of suppression. The control of these forces flow directly from the capitalist’s control of the State which it secures at the ballot box. Socialism will not come through force. Therefore, in order to achieve a peaceful revolution workers must capture the powers of the State at the ballot box and prevent the capitalist class from using the nation’s military against the emerging socialist movement.

At the ballot box the employer can only counts as one against his many workers’ votes. The capitalists are few in number, while the workers number in our millions. The electoral strength of the working class could, if properly used, ensure the triumph of labour in contrast to industrial action where the power of the boss’s bank balance against the meagre savings of his employees will nearly always prevail. The capitalists are men of financial means and resources, and can buy the best brains and command the highest order of ability the market affords. They own the factories, the mills and mines and locomotives and ships and stores and the jobs that are attached to them, and this not only gives them tremendous advantage in the struggle, but makes them for the time the absolute masters of the situation. The workers, on the other hand, are poor as a rule, and ignorant as a class, but they are in an overwhelming majority. In a word, they have the power, but are not conscious of it. This then is the supreme demand; to make them conscious of the power of their class, or class-conscious workingmen. Workers instead choose to fight the employers with strikes but at the ballot box they elect the lackeys of the capitalists to rule them and it is they who make the laws that govern and restrict the ways the workers can fight back. The courts and their legal injunctions have left workers defenceless and at the mercy of its exploiter. When will workers learn from their masters who, not content with their tremendous economic power, unceasingly strive to secure political power in order to entrench their class in its position of supremacy. Shouldn’t we be waking up to the fact that it has not been using its political arm in the struggle and that the ballot which it can wield is strong enough not only to disarm the enemy, but to drive that enemy entirely from the field of battle in the class war.

The trades-union is not and cannot become a political machine, nor can it be used for political purposes. Those such as ourselves who insist upon working class political action not only have no intention to convert the trades-union into a political party, but they would oppose any such attempt on the part of others. The trades-union is an economic organisation with distinct economic functions and as such is a part, a necessary part, but a part only of the labour movement; it has its own sphere of activity, its own programme and is its own master within its economic limitations. It is not by trying to commit socialism to trade-unionism, nor trade unionism to socialism, will the socialist end be accomplished. It is not by seeking to commit trade-union bodies to the principles of socialism. Resolution or commitments of this sort accomplish little good. Nor is it by meddling with the details or the machinery of the trade-unions. A socialist party does not interfere in the internal affairs of the trade unions, nor do socialists seek to have them become distinctively political bodies in themselves. It is best to leave the trade-unions to get on with their distinctive work, as the workers’ defence against the encroachments of capitalism and offer them unqualified support and sympathy to their struggles. It may be true that the trades-union movement has in some respects proved a disappointment, but it may not be repudiated as a failure. The trades-union movement of the present day has enemies within and without, and on all sides, some attacking it openly and others insidiously, but all bent either upon destroying it or reducing it to unresisting impotency.

The trades-union expresses the economic power but it is a socialist party that expresses the political power of the labour movement. It is vital to keep in mind the difference between the two so that neither shall hinder the other. The workers uses both economic and political power in the interest of their class in the struggle against capitalism. The difference between them is that while the trades-union is confined to the trade or occupation, a genuine socialist party embraces the entire working class, and while the union is limited to bettering conditions under the wage system, socialists are organised to conquer the political power , abolish the wage system and make the workers themselves the masters of the Earth. The unions and the socialist party should not only not be in conflict, but act in harmony in every struggle whether it be on the one field or the other, in the strike or at the ballot box. The main thing is that in every struggle the workers shall be united. A trade unionist should no more think of voting a capitalist party than they would turning the union over to the employer and have it run in the interest of management.

Until the workers become a clearly defined socialist movement, standing for and moving toward the unqualified co-operative commonwealth, while at the same time understanding and proclaiming their immediate interests, they will only play into the hands of their exploiters and be led by their betrayers. The Socialist Party takes issue with the left-wing attitude towards elections as being useless and at best unimportant weapons in the class struggle. The Socialist Party uses elections to place before the workers the demand for socialism. It takes advantage of a greater readiness to read political literature, to attend political meetings and take part in political discussions to familiarise workers with the socialist case. Election gives the Socialist Party the opportunity to reach more people when their receptiveness to political ideas are at a higher level and it serves to measure the political shifts and tendencies caused by changes on the economic and political scene.

The Socialist Party is convinced that the present political State, with most of its institutions, must be captured first to then be swepted away. The political State is not and cannot be a true democracy. The Socialist Party is not a parliamentary party. To think that Parliament can be used as the means of permanently improving the conditions of the working class by passing a series of legislative reform acts is to believe in parliamentarism. The Socialist Party believes in entering Parliament only as a means of doing away with what stands in the way of workers controlling the means of production. It urges the workers to use their ballots to capture political power—not to play at politicians and seek political office but to use the power of their votes to uproot the political State to permit the the constructive task of creating the decision making and administration processes of socialist society. Election affords the workers the opportunity to overthrow the political institutions obstructing and hindering their emancipation. The vote is a weapon to be used in the conquest of the State and it is a safer weapon than the rifle.

Parliamentary action is but a part of socialist activity. More important than success in elections is the progress of socialist consciousness in the masses, and success or failure at the polls are only of interest in so far as they permit us to judge the scale and degree of socialist consciousness. Success of a genuine socialist party on the political field and success on the economic field will be multiplied. And vice versa.

A Grave Injustice

The Church of Scotland is to investigate the issue of so-called “funeral poverty” caused by the sharp rise in the cost of burial plots and other associated charges.

Rev Sarah Ross, minister of Forth St Paul’s Parish Church in South Lanarkshire said that her local authority demanded £1,883 up front to carry out a burial, a 183 per cent rise in South Lanarkshire over the cost of burial in 2009, and compares to a cost of a cremation in a council-run crematorium of just £565. Ms Ross accused the council of acting in a “mercenary” way. She said. “In my area, I believe that the council is targeting vulnerable people at the most vulnerable time to make money the easiest possible way.”
Depute Clerk of Lanark Presbytery, Rev Bryan Kerr backed Ms Ross. “We are concerned that local authorities are charging what seems to us to be exorbitant fees for burials,” he said. He said some families may put off burying their loved ones because they cannot raise up-front costs of burial.

How to Stop War

The SNP has announced its future programme to commemorate the First World War.

Alex Salmond said :
"By reflecting on these devastating events, and the consequences they had for communities the length and breadth of Scotland, we will help people of all ages in this country understand more about the futility of war and strengthen our resolve to never let a tragedy like the Great War happen again."

The most common mistake made in the attempt to explain war comes from the belief that this exists somehow independent of capitalism and that it is an aberration or even accidental. War is not the cause of the troubles of society. The opposite is true. War is a symptom and result of the irreconcilable troubles and conflicts of the present form of society, that is to say, of capitalism. The supposed moral, religious, racial and ideological disguises that war garbs itself with should not be allowed to hide the the true cause of modern war.

The only way to fight against war is to fight against the causes of war. Since the causes of war are part of the inner nature of capitalism, it follows that the only way to fight against war is to fight against capitalism. It therefore follows that the only possible struggle against war is the struggle for the socialist revolution. There is no “separate” or “special” struggle against war.

To suppose that socialists can work out a common campaign against war with non-socialists is a fatal illusion. Any organisation based upon such a policy is not merely powerless to prevent war; in practice it acts to promote war, both because it serves in its own way to uphold the system that breeds war, and because it diverts the attention of its members from the real fight against war - the struggle for socialism.

Pacifists spreads illusions about the nature of war and of the fight against war (advocating disarmament, conscientious objection, international treaties as solutions), and thus prevents a true understanding of the nature and causes of war. Many anti-war protesters will have a turn-around once war commences and become patriots in the name of national unity and that we must now support “our” troops.

There prevails a dangerous doctrine which has been systematically propagated during recent years by liberals that a basic distinction must be drawn between the comparatively “good” capitalist nations, the “peace-loving” nations – Great Britain, France, and the United States who only intervene for humanitarian purposes , on the one hand; and, on the other, the altogether “wicked” capitalist aggressive nations such as North Korea and Iran. “Sanctions” are often the precursor of actual hostilities and are presented as a means to avoiding military engagements. But sanctions are war measures. They include withdrawal of financial credit, embargoes on trade, various forms of boycott. To enforce them genuinely would require a blockade of the country against whom the sanctions were invoked. The probable, the almost certain outcome of such a blockade, as history has so often proved, is war – since the blockaded nation cannot accept such a measure peacefully without surrendering political sovereignty. Thus it follows that sanctions must be either ineffectual – a kind of large-scale bluff – or they must lead to war.

The true enemy is at home: our class enemy, the capitalists, and their political representative, the state. This is the enemy to be defeated, in every country. And this is the aim of socialists in every country, the overthrow of the class enemy, the joining together with the working class of the entire world for the defeat of capitalism and the victory of the working class. The business of the working class within any country is never under any circumstances to defend “the government” – that is, the political executive of the class enemy.

By overthrowing the capitalist economic system and supplanting capitalism with a socialism , it will remove the causes of war. In socialism there will no longer exist the basic contradictions that lead to war. The inherent competition between nations will end. Artificial barriers based on national boundaries will be removed. The means of production, under the owner-ship and control of society as a whole, will proceed in accordance with a rational plan adjusted to the needs of the members of society. Socialism permits the scientific and controlled development of production. Thus, war will disappear because the causes of war will be done away with.

Growing Consciousness

Capitalism has become an obsolete oppressive system that ought to be got rid off but the old social order won’t simply disappear of its own accord. Its removal is dependent upon its replacement by socialism. Capitalism itself created the possibility and the necessity of socialism as well as creating the class capable of introducing socialism, the working class. There was no doubt in the minds of pioneers of socialism as to the future. They recognised the slave condition of the workers in capitalism and had faith in the worker’s power and capacity to abolish the slavery and build a new society of free people in a classless society. A relatively small minority recognise this as most people continued trying to satisfy their needs within the system rather than by overthrowing it.
"The proletarian movement is the self-conscious, independent movement of the immense majority, in the interest of the immense majority," Marx and Engels wrote in the Communist Manifesto.

"Self-conscious" implies that the class itself must understand the full significance of its actions and “independent” implies that the class itself must decide the objectives and methods of its struggle.The working class cannot entrust this task to anyone else. No "saviours from on high" will free it, as our workers’ anthem, The International, proclaims. The class will never achieve its power if it relegates the revolutionary struggle to others or substitutes the party for our class. Mass socialist consciousness and mass participation are essential. Socialism, unlike all previous forms of social organisation, requires the constant, conscious and permanent participation of the great majority.

The Socialist Party is frequently reminded of the decline of socialist ideas which presumably means that at some particular point of time in the past, socialist prospects were better because there were then more socialists about, or, if there were not more of them, then they were of a higher calibre and more committed. This view of the past is taken for granted so we would therefore expect the evidence for it. But ample evidence points the other way. The bulk of the working classes gave more or less active support to a variety of resolutely anti-socialist parties and causes. Divisions on ethnic and religious grounds existed. Jingoism and nationalist politics prevailed. Labour leaders had acquired a large stake in moderate reform within capitalism and possessed a deep fear of militancy. The General Strike of 1926 was a remarkable event but it was unplanned and unwanted by the leaders of the TUC which led to their unconditional surrender and although there was much bitterness among the rank and file, there was no grass-roots rebellion. The concept of “workers’ control” receded and class collaboration took its place.

A worker who knows that capitalism is the true enemy, yet cannot find time for the struggle to replace it because he or she is “too busy” in the trade union movement or with involvement in campaigns for reforms has not yet grasped the fundamentals. Socialism is not about the relief of poverty by social reform or a belief in nationalisation and co-ops to improve administrative efficiency, all of which have been proved possible within a capitalist framework, but about the abolition of capitalism as an economic and social system. It is not about the improvement in the condition of the working class, but about the abolition of that class. It is not about the creation of a “people’s capitalism”.

Nor is there the slightest relation between Marx’s vision of the future socialist society and the system that once reigned in the old Soviet Union. For all its cosmetic veneer of Marxist terminology, Soviet reality was everything both Marx and Engels abhorred and criticised all their lives. And it is indeed difficult to believe they would not have fought against it if they had been alive. We can debate the intricacies of whether Russia was state-capitalist or simply just a slave-state but there is no question of it being a workers’s state or a step closer towards socialism. Surely, there isn’t anybody who would contend that the workers had any power in the so-called Soviet Union. In Russia the state owns the means of production, but who owns the state? Certainly not the workers!There was no “dictatorship of the proletariat”, rather there was the dictatorship of the Party. The “union” of “soviets” was a fiction within days and months of the Bolshevik October Revolution. It is a fraud to assert that there was a qualitative difference in the Russia of Lenin and that of Stalin. The Leninist “insurrectionary” road to socialism demands centralised decision making and communication, which is not a favourable environment for the growth of democracy. The revolution as we saw was strangled and developed into a dictatorship.

A Bleak Future

There is a popular image of old age painted by press, TV and advertising companies of elderly people surrounded by adoring grandchildren in rocking chair contentment, but according to a recent study by Prudential it is far from the truth. One in five people retiring in Britain in 2013 will fall below the income poverty line , and nearly a quarter of women will enter retirement entirely dependent on the basic state pension. 'One in seven (14%) people planning to retire in 2013 will depend on the state pension, currently a maximum of £110.15 a week, as they have no other pension arranged. Among women the figure rises to 23% compared to 8% of men. Even those with a small private pension may still be below the poverty line, which the Joseph Rowntree Foundation estimates to be £8,254 a year for a single pensioner in the UK. Prudential found that 18% of people retiring this year would have an income below that level.' (Guardian, 22 May) RD

Ye are many-- they are few

We were sold a dream of a fictitious caring, sharing Welfare State. We were told that if we studied and worked hard we would be promised a well-paid job which would be enough to pay for a comfortable home to raise a family. Workers have been finding out that this was all a lie. The question now is what happens next.

We have had all the failed palliatives meant to patch up the flaws and faults of the system. We have had New Deals, Old Deals and Raw Deals in abundance. But although things could get worse, we shouldn’t completely despair. Social change is happening. The stories of the poor and the nearly poor, and the hardships they endure, are now being told. The anti-austerity and Occupy protests have introduced (or more accurately re-introduced) resistance, challenging the centres of power and calling for the re-building of society. Trade unions are once again discovering their back-bone and asserting their industrial muscle. Everything is in motion and we ourselves are that movement.
Class struggle means refusing to succumb to fear and refusing to surrender. It means saying no more compromise or no more concessions. Enough is enough. Hope and history are companions: one looks forward and one looks back. If we look forward, we’ll see where we have to go. We look backward to grasp clearly what we are moving forward from, and to understand the paths others have made so we can map our own road forward.

Hopelessness often comes from amnesia of our past, forgetting that everything is in flux, everything changes. There’s the people’s counter-history that we don’t learn in school and don’t see on the TV: the history of the battles we’ve won, of the rights we’ve gained, of the differences between then and now. We forget that we fought for the vote, the eight-hour day, for workplace health and safety and for free access to education and health-care. If we forget how we won them, then we can lose them again. Even in our defeats and set-backs the seeds for future more successful struggles were sown.

Things change and people have the power to make that happen when they come together and act as one and not alone.

"Rise like lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number,
Shake your chains to earth like dew,
Which in sleep had fallen on you--
Ye are many-- they are few."
Shelley

Two Different Americas

Larry Ellison, the Oracle Corp. chief executive has bought nearly two dozen properties in the Malibu beach area. 'Ellison has spent an estimated $200 million to $250 million through at least nine purchases, in one case of multiple homes, on coveted Carbon Beach.' (Los Angeles Times, 5 May) 'The US may be the richest country in the world but 44m of its citizens rely on food stamps. One in every two children receive federal food assistance. And when stamps give you food buying power of just $3 a day, practically the only groceries you can buy are processed junk.' (Guardian, 8 May) This contrast of wealth and poverty is only possible in a production for profit society and surely needs to be abolished now. RD

Who are the revolutionaries?

Maximising profit and maintaining social control are the two priority tasks of the ruling class. Centuries of struggle and sacrifice were required to wrest the vote from the clutches of the landed gentry and the big business bosses and to place it in the hands of workers. It has now become fashionable amongst so-called socialists to denounce democracy, parliamentarism and democratic forms of government as obsolete. All manner of schemes for the“reform” of the democratic machine has been devised to not simply supplement but instead to supersede Parliament. Yet it has been the abuse and not the use of its power that has been responsible for the faults of parliamentarianism. The political ignorance of working men and women forged their own chains and they have been the unconscious authors of their own misery.


Workers fall victim of the false promises of the capitalist parties and their campaign publicists and lobbyists who snare the votes of deluded and unthinking workers. Professional politicians of whatever party are very much alike and they all serve the interests of their masters. Their stock in trade is the credulity of the masses. Capitalist parties stand for the capitalist system, and such differences as there are amongst them involve no principle but are just the outcome of the differing interests and policies of the various large and small capitalists.The politicians play one section of society off against the other and playing upon prejudice is the rule that governs their campaigns for votes among the workers. The competition for the votes of the wage-workers is the distinguishing feature of every election campaign. The supposed party of the “common people”, the Labour Party, long ago adopted policies that served employers and not the employee. There are no longer any distinctly different political parties. These have all merged in the same party and it is the Capitalist Party, by whatever name it may be known.

 At each and every election members of the working class are voting in their enemies. The mainstream political parties reek with corruption in their servility to the capitalist class, torn with strife in their mad scramble for the spoils of office. Political schemers and opportunists will turn parties to their personal ends to satisfy their egotistical lust to be hero-worshipped. Political posers will stand upon the shoulders of workers imagining their towering position is the result of their innate ability as they call to the rest of us to see what great men they are. A mistaken belief in the need for leaders emasculates the workers own confidence in themselves.

Election platforms and programmes are filled with empty platitudes and meaningless phrases, but they are discreetly silent about the millions of unemployed, about the starvation wages of factory slaves, about the women and children who are crushed, debased and slowly tormented to death by capitalism, about the bitter poverty of people and their hopeless future, and about every other vital question which is worthy of an instant's consideration by any intelligent human being. The capitalist parties are without principles and without ideals. Wage-slavery, the legalised robbery of workers, is never mentioned, much less acted upon.

Socialism is not reform, it is a revolution. When the word “revolution” is spoken people think of violence and of bloodshed. Therefore to use the term without explanation is to risk getting seriously misunderstood. The Socialist Party would regard it a calamity to the socialist cause, as well as to humanity, to have a violent upheaval in society. The campaign of the Socialist Party is essentially educational; an appeal to intelligence and reason. It may well happen that in the future we could see violence and civil war, but if such should be the case it would not be the result of the socialists, but rather the result of the refusal of the ruling class to accept socialism. For socialism offers a possible peaceful solution by a willing majority. .

Whoever holds firmly to the necessity of the organisation of the working class into an independent political party, distinct from and opposed to all pro-capitalist parties to capture the powers of government” in order to carry out the principles of socialism is a revolutionary.

“Those who repudiate political revolution as the principle means of social transformation, or wish to confine this to such measures as have been granted by the ruling class are social reformers, no matter how much their social ideas may antagonise existing social forms. ” - Karl Kautsky, The Social Revolution:

Empty Rhetoric

Tremendous press coverage always follows parliamentary debates and legislation. Politicians always emphasise its importance and of course their own importance. 'The Child Poverty Act of 2010 holds the government accountable for reducing child poverty. On Wednesday, new figures from the Institute for Fiscal Studies show that not only are they failing to do so, the numbers of children living in poverty will actually rise, from 2.4 million to 3.4 million by 2020 – the date that was set for the elimination of child poverty in the UK.' (Guardian, 8 May) So after all that pompous talk and so-called erudition what is the result? More kids are living in poverty than before the brilliant legislation. RD

Understanding class

There are two classes in society - the one possessing wealth and owning the means of its production, the other making the wealth by using those tools and technology but only with the permission and only for the benefit of the possessors. These two classes are necessarily in opposition to one another. We have before us today, in capitalist society, masters and slaves, exploiters and exploited but to put it more bluntly, robbers and the robbed. Two economic forces whose interests ceaselessly clash, are pitted against each other. These two classes can never be reconciled and it is this that we call the class struggle. Workers, be they “white” or “blue” collar, skilled or unskilled, because they are workers, cannot survive except by selling their labouring power. Yet were it not for the working class, the whole social fabric would collapse in an instant. It is they who do the useful work. It is they who produce the wealth.

UCS - A Brave Defence

“We don't only build ships on the Clyde, we build men. They have taken on the wrong people and we will fight." - Jimmy Reid


Occupations and sit-ins in Britain have been primarily used as a defensive method in union struggles as a means to oppose redundancies in a more determined manner. Occupying work-places are seen as a tactical improvement on conventional striking. After all, It’s warmer sitting-in, rather than standing outside picketing .

The Upper Clyde Shipyards Shipyards (UCS) work-in of 1971–72 posed, implicitly if not explicitly, the question of workers’ control of industry. Sit-in strikes challenges property rights and no matter how temporary, it does represent a seizure of ‘company property’ which is held ransom until the workers’ demands are hopefully met. No employer likes the idea of having their property seized, or having their plant used as bargaining power. But if the occupation is peaceful and unlikely to spread, why risk confrontation by management instigated evictions? In Glasgow, Chief Constable David McNee warned he would need 5000 additional policemen to keep control of the city if the yards closed

“The problem facing the leaders of the UCS workers was to devise a new technique of struggle which would achieve their objective, to prevent redundancies and closures, in what was bound to be a tough struggle. A strike could play into the hands of the employers when they were set on closure anyway. A sit-in would have been difficult to maintain for long enough. It would have also given the employers a good excuse to attack the workers by arguing that the sit-in made it impossible to fulfil any contract and aggravated the bankrupt situation. This could have helped the Tories to alienate public opinion from support of the UCS workers.” - UCS – The Fight for the Right to Work by A. Murray, Communist Party.

Strike action is inappropriate so instead overtime bans, go-slows were the order of the day. Trade Union officials, far from leading any fight against redundancies, often actively involved themselves in negotiations of phased sackings. The demands ‘last in, first out’, ‘voluntary retirement’, ‘natural wastage’ reflected the defensive nature of trade unions.

The UCS workers wanted to complete the partly-built ships and launch them (and even start on new ships already designed and commissioned). The employers and the state wanted to close down the yards.

The support for the UCS work-in was high within the working class, particularly in Scotland, expressed in two regional general strikes. The work-in also generated wide support beyond the organised labour movement. John Foster and Charles Woolfson in British Trade Unions and Industrial Politics, Vol 2 wrote:
“The ploy of ‘working-in’, which forced the government to accept the continuance of the yards as a going concern, immediately ranged behind the workers the 700 creditor firms which stood to lose all they were owed as well as the custom they depended on for the future. It forced local authorities, even the Conservative controlled Glasgow Council to confront the dilemma of supporting ‘their communities’ or the government. It took leadership of the dispute out of the hands of the official movement and temporarily neutralised a Scottish press which tended towards the Conservative Party (Herald and Scottish Daily Express) or right-wing Labour (Record) This response, of seeking to work upon and include the specific interests of local business and the professions in the regional economy, was based precisely on what [Jimmy] Reid reported to the C[ommunist]P[arty] national executive; an analysis of the specific contradictions of monopoly capitalism."

Despite all this, the movement came nowhere near bringing about a social overturn. But the work-in did force major concessions out of the government. In July 1971, the 8,000 took possession of the shipyards and held them for 15 months. As the authors point out:
“By October 1972 when the sit-in ended they had forced the Conservative government to abandon almost all its original objectives. Most of the 8000 jobs remained. Four yards were in operation. Worse still for the government, it had been pushed into a much wider reversal of regional policy. Its original intention in ending credits to the publicly-owned Upper Clyde Shipbuilders (UCS) had been to demonstrate its determination to stop support for all ailing industries. Now it had to reverse its entire regional policy and pay for a massive refloatment on the Clyde."

The UCS struggle continued for 16 months until October 1972. In the end the Tory government was forced into a U-turn and had to come up with £35 million in public money, plus millions more in credit, to maintain 8,000 jobs at UCS, in conjunction with a US company.

“Not a yard will close - Not a man down the road". Sadly, Socialist Courier has to note that years later the jobs and the yards saved no longer exist. But nevertheless 8,000 workers were kept in employment for longer than they would have been.

Trotskyist critics attacked the Communist Party leadership of the work-in for selling out and betrayal because they limited the struggle. They did not press for the extension of work-ins and workers’ control. These criticisms were unjustified. Reid and Fairlie cannot be criticised for settling for what was possible, given the relationship of forces and the general level of consciousness and organisation of the labour movement at the time, instead of indulging in ‘revolutionary’ gestures doomed to failure.

The UCS work-in demonstrated that closures and redundancy need not be passively accepted and that alternatives existed. The UCS work-in raised the expectations of thousands and captured the imagination of many more. A solidarity march from George Square to Glasgow Green saw 80,000 strong protest. 200,000 took part in what was effectively a partial general strike.

In the months and years that followed the commencement of the work-in, the idea of resistance spread. Workers at Plesseys of Alexandria, at the Scottish Daily Express with the publication of the Scottish Daily News and later Henry Robbs of Leith tried the same tactics. Capitalism in the end always prevailed.

Barriers To Socialism

There are many barriers to the ideas of socialism but at least one of them seems to be weakening. 'One in four people no longer believes in any religion, official analysis of national census returns found yesterday. It revealed Christianity is in decline and Christians are increasingly likely to be older or retired people. Many young people, young men in particular, appear to be rejecting religious belief altogether. Nearly one in three under-25s – 32 per cent – say they do not have a religion.' (Daily Mail, 17 May) Now we have to get rid of some of the other barriers - patriotism, racialism, sexism before we can get rid of the worst ism. Capitalism! RD

The Real Union Question

Have no illusions about the role of governments, the police or the law - the defence of capitalism and exploitation is the main function of the capitalist state.

Both Marx and Engels advised the workers to unite in trade unions and fight for improved wages and shorter hours. In these struggles, victories would be won. The workers could wring concessions out of the capitalists. “Now and then”, the Communist Manifesto explained “the workers are victorious, but only for a time. The real fruit of their battles lies, not in the immediate result, but in the ever-expanding union of the workers.”

The hand-to-mouth existence of the workers has never made it easy to strike for higher wages and better working conditions. The employers can recuperate lost profits, the workers’ lost wages cannot. As long as the capitalist system exists, the bosses will always try to take back what they have been forced to concede. They will continually try to step up the exploitation of the working class in order to boost their profits.

Young and without a future

A report for the Scotland Institute – The Changing Face Of Youth Unemployment In Scotland 1992 To 2012 – found that over the past two decades, youth employment has gone from being characterised as consisting of stable, relatively well-paid work with career prospects to short-term, part-time, poorly paid work with limited long-term prospects.


Report author Dr Roger Cook, the research director at the institute, said: “Twenty years of sustained removal of employment protection and the casualisation of work has created a situation where young people are becoming trapped in low-paid work with limited longer-term opportunities... This is the conscious outcome of an approach to the labour market over 20 years that has stressed flexibility and ignored the impact of this on people’s working lives or standard of living. Those who are relatively well educated are finding jobs but those jobs are less likely to offer a career, progression, security or a decent wage than was the case even in the depths of recession under the 1992-1997 government. Stagnation of wages and loss of security has wider implications than just inflicting hardship on individuals.”

Cricket And Capitalism

Capitalism distorts everything it touches including sport. 'Legendary Indian batsman Rahul Dravid has spoken of his anguish after three players from the team he captains in the Indian Premier league were arrested over allegations of spot-fixing. The Rajasthan Royals captain said he was "shocked" at S. Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila's arrests. On Thursday, a court sent the players into police custody for five days.' (BBC News, 17 May)Dravid may well be in anquish but he can't be that surprised, for last year Indian cricket officials suspended five players after a sting by undercover TV reporters purported to show cricketers agreeing to bowl no-balls and spot-fix matches. And in 2011, three top Pakistani players - Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir - were banned after they were found guilty of involvement in a betting scam. RD

Two Different Worlds

Socialism is a society wherein every human being capable of it works according to their ability and in return takes according to their needs. Capitalism is a society wherein a small minority own the means of production and distribution and where the majority must work for a wage or a salary and produce a surplus value enjoyed by the small minority. So how is capitalism faring today? 'The unemployment rate in Britain has risen for the third successive quarter, with 15,000 more people jobless and looking for work in the three months to March. The total rose to 2.75 million, pushing the official unemployment rate up to 7.8 per cent of the workforce.' (Times, 16 May) Nearly 3 million people are stopped from producing wealth today in Britain. Think of a world socialist society and how much more productive it could be than a production for profit society like capitalism. RD

La Belle Sansculotte

LA BELLE SANSCULOTTE


She is coming, O my masters, she is coming in her might,
With the red flag o’er her legions and her sword sharp, clean and bright;
She is breaking through your dungeons, she is tearing off your chain,
She is coming to take vengeance without mercy once again!

She is coming, O my masters, with a new might in her arms,
Her vision clear, unclouded by a dying Satan’s charms;
She is coming in hate’s beauty, with love’s fierceness in her eye,
Like a maddened mother hast’ning where your tortured child-slaves die!

She is coming, O my masters, with her strong, steel-muscled hands,
She is reaching for your factories, your gardens and your lands;
She is calling to her standard all the sons of grief and toil,
She is promising your soldiers all your stolen wealth for spoil.

She is coming, O my masters! ’Neath her red, triumphal arch,
Lo! the guards that now surround you in her rebel ranks shall march!
She is coming as forever and forever she has come,
Arm in arm with Hope and Freedom, to the long roll of Right’s drum!

She is coming, O my masters! Soon her troops shall rest their feet
In the limpid waters flowing through your bowers, cool and sweet;
Soon her hungered hosts shall gather in your gold-roofed banquet hall,
And to ecstatic music hold high revel o’er your fall!

She is coming, O my masters, she is coming in her might,
With the red flag o’er her legions and her sword sharp, clean and bright!
She is coming in hate’s beauty, with love’s fierceness in her eye,
Like a maddened mother hast’ning where your tortured child-slaves die!

By Covington Hall
Oldtime Industrial Unionist

Our Benevolent Masters

The owning class and all their "experts" are always trying to improve the health of the working class, so the following report should come as no surprise to anyone. 'Research by the the Institute of Economic Affairs found that both mental and physical health can suffer, and that the Government should help people work longer and raise the state pension ages. The study - Work Longer, Live Healthier: The Relationship Between Economic Activity, Health And Government Policy - shows there is a small boost in health immediately after retirement but that, over the longer term, there is a significant deterioration. It suggests retirement increases the likelihood of suffering from clinical depression by 40 per cent and the chance of having at least one diagnosed physical condition by about 60 per cent.' (Daily Telegraph, 16 May) Despite this touching concern for the health of the working class the owning class seem to live long and healthy lives without the added benefits of anything remotely resembling hard work. RD

Life Is Cheap In Capitalism

The recent loss of over 1,000 worker's lives in a Bangladesh factory is not peculiar to that country. 'Cambodian clothing industry workers have been killed in the partial collapse of the shoe factory where they worked, adding to the loss of life in the Asian industry of making garments for the west. ...........Authorities told the Associated Press that two bodies had been pulled from the wreckage and at least seven people were injured, while a union official speaking to the Reuters news agency put the death toll at six or more. There were estimates of up to 50 people trapped in the wreckage.' (Guardian, 16 May) Reports say it is unclear how many people remain trapped. Capitalism in its drive for greater and greater profits roves the world and Asia is an attractive source of cheap unprotected labour. The garment industry is Cambodia's biggest export earner. In 2012 more than $4bn worth of products were shipped to the United States and Europe. RD