SIX MONTHS into a Labour government the employers' offensive continues, ably abetted and encouraged by government.
Blair has said he wants to teach the rest of Europe about the benefits of flexibility. For the workforce flexibility means casualisation and loD insecurity.
The privatisation of public services continues, whether through Private Finance Initiative, or 'best value'. The anti-union laws remain in their entirety and their will be little real movement on rights at work.
Schemes like welfare to work and the abolition of lone parent benefit are not only intended to reduce state spending but bring down pay in general by forcing people to work on low wages.
When the outcome of the commission is finally announced, the national minimum wage will probably be regional, not apply to young workers and be pitifully low.
Despite the bluster, the deterioration of the NHS and education continue, and the announcement that Britain will join the single European currency, even if not quite yet, guarantees that Brown will attempt to hold down spending permanently.
What are our union leaders doing in response? The long-running disputes (Dockers, Magnet, Hillingdon, Critchley Labels, Project Aerospace) have been an inspiration to activists The shape of things to with their willing- come? GMB heavyweight ness to fight on John Edmonds backs off against the odds. any fight with Blair But the leaders have done everything possible to undermine and sell them out, just as the TGWU did with the British Airways dispute. Ballots for strike action have been used as a mere nerouaang tool.
Nor are these bureaucrats demanding anything from the Labour government. At Labour Party conference they ensured the resolutions on union rights con. tained nothing Blair would object to, and made sure nothing else was passed which might make him uncomfortable.
Complaints about Blair's hectoring tone at TUC did not prevent them making it a week that did nothing to worry the government or the bosses.
The union leaders are concerned at the loss of members, primarily because it endangers their pay and perks. Their answer is not to recruit by showing unions can protect workers against employers, but to draw up ever more 'attractive' packages of credit cards, insurance schemes and package holidays.
Just as Blair wants to sanitise the Labour Party, making it immune to influence by workers in struggle, there are signs that the employers, often in collusion with union officials, re attempting to behead any fightback in advance by victimising militants.
What should the response of activists be in this situation?
Firstly, we have to argue against the concept of 'partnership', which results in continual concessions to the employers on pay, conditions and jobs and for a strategy based on industrial action. Where action is taken locally, it should be made official, whether legal or not.
Unions should organise national campaigns, including industrial action, against national attacks and to force the Labour government to carry out their demands (e.g. national minimum wage, employment rights). Where national action is not forthcoming, the left should attempt to coordinate regional action.
Public sector unions need to link up with service users, both to apply additional political pressure on their employers and to give confidence to their members to take industrial action. he anti-union laws are still one of the main roadblocks to any fightback, restricting the right to take action, and preventing its spreading when it does. We need to force their repeal, linking a campaign for changing the policy of the unions to support for all strikes, illeral or not, and for solidarity action. The new Free Trade Unions Campaign can play a leading role in this.
The left has to organise within each union against the undemocratic practice and continual sell outs of the union leaderships. These Left bodies have to be open, democratic and campaignWhile they should contest union elections. their main emphasis has to be on winning the support of the membership for alternative policies to those of the leadership and for industrial action. Where possible and necessary, they should initiate industrial action against the wishes of the leadership.
The Trade Union Lefts Alliance can play a crucial role in linking up these left bodies in the different unions, initiating cross-union campaigns on policy, providing solidarity action, and beginning to provide an alternative leadership to that of the TUC. Shoulder to shoulder - in a common struggle to containt the union rank and file. "Participation" in practice as TGWU national cars officer Grenville Hawley (right) joins forces with BL Cowley boss Geoff Whalen in 1975.