NUPE says: insults

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'SELECTIVE ACTION by a NUPE ambulance worker In the winter of 1978-9, two months of the most intensive industrial action ever seen in the public services brought struggles by hospital staff and ambulance drivers, alongside local authority workers and school staff.

The public sector manual workers however wound up with a miserable £2-3 in their pay packets - and for hospital ancillary staff even part of this increase was later to be snatched back under Professor Clegg's so-called 'comparability inquiry.

The weakness was not that of the membership, whose militancy had reached an all-time high. On January 22 1979 over 1 million public sector workers took action in pursuit of their 160/35 hour week claim, and 60,000 marched through London.

From that point onwards hundreds of sections of workers showed time after time that they were prepared to face the most massive scabbing operation organised by the Labour government, involving the use of police, troops and 'volunteers' , backed up by a large-scale Tory press witch-hunt.

They organised strike committees which for a period virtually took over control of the public services in whale cities, and formed links with trade unionists in supply industries.

This action was defeated above Socialist Organiser Alliance SOCIALIST Organiser fights to act as a real campaigning paper which can organise the treacherous policies and practices of the public sector union leaders.

The claim had been launched at NUPE's 1978 conference and quickly taken up as a common claim by thethree other major public sector unions -COHSE, GMWU and TGWU.

But despite arm-waving speeches bellowing about the plight of low paid workers, NUPE leader Alan Fisher was in no way ready to lead a fight if it meant a head-on confrontation with the Labour government.

He was instrumental in delaying action on the claim, which should have begun on the earliest settlement date in Sinus November.

At that point Ford workers were already on strike against Healey's 5% pay limit, soon to be followed by bakers, tanker and haulage drivers.

But Fisher kept hedging and delaying, plainly hoping that the militancy of NUPE's rank and file would die away as the other struggles were defeated.

But they were not defeated, and instead militancy in the public sector grew with every blow meted out to Healey's pay policy.

The response to the January 22 Day of Action was far beyond all expectations, forcing the bureaucrats to maintain the public appearance of fighting for the claim for fear of losing control of low pay PIERLIER EMPIRES Many nurses are afraid to act because of the fear of victimisation — nurses are always in a very precarious position.

Their jobs depend on ward reports from Sisters. Some nurses have even been intimidated by management from attending union meetings — never mind striking. The key problem is unionisation - the fight to show that the so-called "professional' organisation, The Royal College of Nursing, can do nothing for nurses.

The RCN is constitutionally barred from taking strike action. This leaves them prey to each and every government decision to penalise low-paid health workers by further poverty-line pay rises — and incapable of seriously fighting cuts and closures in the NHS.

But the RCN is not affiliated to the TUC and its members are not therefore covered by the Bridlington 'no poaching' agreements. They are not only 'fair game' for unionisation: nurses' interests can only be defended by their organisation into genuine trade unions such as COHSE and NUPE, coupled with a fight for action within those unions.

Socialists in the NHS should be at the forefront of this fight for unionisation and a new militant leadership.

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of 'winter MEA

CLI ¡UPES says: MON+ COMICALL

Low Paid