ennancement for working long hours. the drive comes from their fear that if they do not agree to their managers' Te tess - even seem ence to do so - they could well end up without a job at all.
None of these workers will see their lives enhanced as a result of the European Union directive. On the contrary it is only through the strengthening of trade union organisation and the ability of workers CONFERENCE SATURDAY NOV 30 10.30 am - 5 pm South Camden Community School Charrington Street London NWI Contributors include: Clyde Chitty (Co-author Thirty Years On); Hilary Wainwright (Editor Red Pepper); and Carole Regan NUT President (personal capacity)
€ 10 waged, £2 unwaged ise to hold a referendum before any decision to join the single European currency should be welcomed as a significant step forward.
Of course many will have reservations about the way this latest policy shift - like most of New Labour's political platform - has been simply proclaimed by one of Blair's inner sanctum (Gordon Brown) with no prior discussion or agreement in the official organisations of the Labour Party.
So what appears to be a concession to grant greater democracy emerges in a completely undemocratic fashion.
But why has Blair's team pronounced this shiit of policy, anc what are its implications?
There is no doubt that it is an important shift. While Labour has not explicitly opposed a referendum, this is the first categoric promise that one would be held, to allow voters a say on whether or not to proceed.
With the Tories in the electoral doldrums and plagued by an increasingly virulent species of chauvinist 'sceptics', Labour has for several years been seen by the European bourgeoisie as the party most likely to deliver a single currency and further British integration into the EU.
Blair has been feted by Germany's Chancellor Kohl and by others for precisely this reason.
But as the Tory sceptics have gained ground, and the potentially disastrous German workers fight Maastricht economic and social policies that would be required to meet the Maastricht convergence criteria have become more obvious, Major has perceptibly shifted ground, taking his distance from the EU and the single currency Creating and cranking up a headline-grabbing row with Brussels over the 48-hour week issue has been a convenient peg on which Major has chosen to hang Tory claims that the minimal rights and protection of working conditions offered by the EU social chapter would "destroy jobs'.
From this the Tories had already begun to sketch out a campaign to brand Labour as the poodle of the dreaded Brussels bureaucrats.
Labour s private polls show that this would be an electoral weaknessand that is why, within days of the Tory switch, Labour, too seems to have climbed aboard the Euro-sceptic Many activists will assume that it is impossible for Blair to win a referendum vote in favour of a single currency when the price to be paid includes massive cuts of upwards of f18 billion in public spending, with ruinous consequences for the welfare state But we should question whether Blair himself sees a referendum as unwinnable, and whether this pledge.
rather than simply offering Labour a decent escape route from a single currency, may not be a more sophisticated way of postponing any decisions until after the next election.
Labour's shadow Treasury spokesman Alistair Darling, questioned by Radio 5 on the referendum pledge, insisted that no decision has yet been taken for or against a single currency. In other words Labour has still not ruled out a possible decision to join.
But in order to keep the option open, the incoming Labour government would have to take action to comply with the Maastricht criteria: it would have to begin the spending cuts needed to reduce the spending deficit to the permitted limit of 3% of Gross Domestic Product.
It would have to hand control of domestic monetarv nolicv to al privatised Bank of England- and carry out all the unpopular austerity policies which have already triggered angry resistance in Germany, France, Beizum, Italy and Spain.
Could Tony Blair, carried away by party plebiscite on the "Road to the Manifesto", really believe he could win a referendum, despite the strident opposition of much of the Tory press and mass media?
We don't know the answer to this puzzle, and we may have to wait months to find out.
But what is clear is that while we support the call for a democratic vote on any decision to join a single currency, it is not enough take an agnostic stance on European Monetary The Maastricht process is already massacring jobs and vital public services across Europe.
The full implementation of the Treaty would place an unelected quango of eight bankers in charge of the EU economy, a quango which would decide the future of the jobs and living standards of the European workino cass on the hasis nt het tor profits of a small minority of capitalists.
Labour should say now that there is nothing to be gained for workers from a single currencv. and that a abour government will reject the Maastricht criteria.
Instead Labour and the TUC should link up with the trade unions and mass movements throughout Europe, which are fighting back against austerity.
Our fight is to establish a New Europe of working people, not a Europe for bosses, bankers and bureaucrats.
Socialist Outlook I|/ • November 23 1996.
Consequently there is a risk of break
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