AGAINST WILSON
By Ernest Tate
London
The ninety-ninth annual conference of the Trades Union Congress held at Brighton September 4-8 made glaring the deepening contradictions between the trade unions and the Labour government in several key policy areas. The results of the conference have profound implications for the coming Labour party annual conference in Scarborough where the union bloc votes will carry the day.
At Brighton, government supporters -~ who include the majority of the General Council -- were defeated on motions which called into question the government line on economic affairs, on the prices and incomes policy and on Vietnam. A kiteflier by the government on a "means-test" for social services was also shot down.
The spectre of unemployment hovered over the gathering and this fear determined the mood of the delegates, many of whom have bitter memories of the depression. Summer jobless figures in Britain are at their worst since World War II -- 500,000 in July ~-- and it is estimated they will rise to over 750,000 by the middle of winter. This was a recurring theme during the conference.
Even Sir Harry Douglass, a rightwing stalwart, was forced to acknowledge it in his presidential address and to warn the government that "the trade union movement was not prepared to accept the discipline of unemployment."
Discontent with the Wilson leadership ran rampant through the conference. Prior to the opening, it reached right into the TUC ruling body, the General Council, which split eighteen to fourteen on whether or not it should recommend acceptance or rejection of a composite resolution strongly criticizing the government.
The motion, entitled Plan for Economic Progress, was submitted by the Shopworkers, ASSET [Association of Supervisory Staff, Executives and Technicians] and SOGAT [Society of Graphical and Allied Trades]. It called upon the conference to deplore "the use by the Government of traditional deflationary measures to manage the economy which involve the creation of a pool of unemployed workers..." and to reject "the -Government's intervention in collective bargaining as a solution to the country's economic problems."
It asked the government to maintain full employment, control the export
and import of capital, reduce military
expenditures, limit and stabilize prices,
rents, dividends and profits and to in-
crease productivity and encourage the
recognition of trade unions by all of
industry.
The motion concluded by stating,
"any plan for economic progress resulting
in a real growth of wages and salaries
can only be achieved by an extension of
public ownership which it considers vital
to any national economic plan."
In debate on this motion, the gov-
ernment could find few defenders -- only
Les Cannon of the Electrical Trades Union,
one of the most reactionary leaders of
the TUC, and J.R.Peel of the Dyers and
Bleachers. Of the first six speakers to
take the rostrum, only one supported the
government.
As Richard Seabrook of the Shop-
workers put it, if there was deep distrust
in the General Council of government pol-
icy, then it was even truer of the dele-
gates.
Clive Jenkins of ASSET dismissed
as a "panacea" George Woodcock's appeal
for a £100 million injection into the
economy. What was needed, he said, was
an entirely new strategy.
"It's not enough for the Govern-
ment to say they've been blown off
course," he said. "If that happens once
it is an accident; if it happens twice
it's a coincidence; but if it happens
three times it means the flight plan is
wrong."
To thunderous applause, Jenkins
urged the government to "adopt new terms
of reference, adopt a new strategy and we
will work as hard as we can to bring it
to fruition."
The motion carried over the objec-
tions of the platform by 4,883,000 to
3,502,000.
This victory was substantial in
itself, but had the Amalgamated Engineer-
ing Union LAEU] vote also been thrown
against the government, it would have been
a virtual landslide. And the response to
the way in which the AEU vote was given
to the government testified to the lead-
ership's difficulties.
When John Boyd, AEU president Car-
ron's loyal lieutenant, stood up to cast
the union's vote against the motion,
there was an immediate outburst from the
AEU delegates as they took the floor to
shout, "That's Carron's vote, not the vote of the AEU!"
Earlier, the majority of the 26man AEU delegation had circulated a petition attacking "the dictatorial attitude of Brother Carron" for refusing to allow a democratic vote in the delegation on its attitude to the motion. Carron had cynically referred to his ruling as "Carron's law."
On the prices and incomes policy, a resolution supporting the government was defeated by 4,270,000 to 4,109,000. Many of the delegates were bitter over the recent 10.5 percent increase by the Electricity Board in electricity rates.
A sharp attack was made against Wilson by a former member of the government's Prices and Incomes Board, Ray Willis, SOGAT joint secretary. Commenting on Wilson's take-over of the responsibility for economic affairs, he said, "Having known the fiery turbulence of George Brown and having suffered the icy freeze of Michael Stewart, we have now been led into the mist of indecision by an overlord who is past master of the art of invective."
What trust, he asked, could be placed any longer in government policy that had "rigorously and almost brutally held down wages" and at the same time increased prices while creating the biggest unemployment problem in postwar years? In putting forward the policy originally, he said, the government had had almost the full backing of unions. "It had our confidence and our trust and it failed."
W.L.Kendal of the Civil Service Clerical Association spoke of "callous complacency and government policies which seem finally and absolutely out of control and which are beginning to take on a mad momentum of their own." He predicted an unemployment level of 750,000 by February.
Moving another composite resolution on the Incomes and Prices Policy, Dan McGarvey of the Boilermakers stated, "I hope this congress will say to Harold Wilson he has not yet the monopoly of the custodianship of democratic socialism. We say to Harold Wilson you are there by the grace of God and the Labour Party.
"The message for Harold Wilson in our resolution is that you have been tried and it has failed. Try to do something better and collect the support of those you have lost in time enough for the next election."
On Vietnam, defenders of the Labour government again found themselves -816-
in a minority. By 4,686,000 to 3,319,000, delegates overrode General Council's demand that a motion be defeated, calling upon the government to dissociate itself from the American bombing of North Vietnam. They said that the resolution was already TUC policy.
Yes, said J.E.Mortimer of DATA [Draughtsmen and Allied Technicians' Association], Congress last year had called for a stopping of the bombing -- this was the movement's official policy. But what had happened since then? Had the bombing stopped? On the contrary, it had intensified, and Wilson had promised that in the event that Hanoi and Haiphong were bombed, the government would not support the United States. What had changed Mr. Wilson in carrying out his promise because now the cities of North Vietnam were being bombed?
Those who supported the U.S. were becoming more isolated. He appealed to the delegates not to place themselves on the side of those reactionary forces inside the U.S. who are for intensifying the bombing in Vietnam and at the same time are promoting antilabour legislation for their own working class.
"Are we to continue to support," asked C. Bush of the Civil Service Clerical Association, "a policy which spews freedom from the belly of a bomber and prosperity from the muzzle of a rifle. Strange fruits from the hands of a delivering angel."
This motion, exceptionally mild in its demands, and by no means meeting the needs of the Vietnamese people -- the recognition of their right to selfdetermination -- nevertheless called forth a red-baiting attack from some of the right-wing spokesmen.
The sum total of the opposition victories do not make an alternative strategy for changing government policy. There was no mention of a strategy for on-the-job action to turn back the government offensive.
If the unions wished, they could begin a campaign for the shorter work week which would mobilize the workers and begin to make headway in that area where it has the most influence. By and large, the positions adopted went no further than the pre-1964 position of the Labour party, but mild as they are, they provide the umbrella for an effective socialist opposition.
The next stage in the battle is Scarborough, the Labour party conference in early October.
September 8.
THE BY-ELECTIONS IN CAMBRIDGE AND WALTHAMSTOW
The