Unexpected ally helps halt frenzied hunt for "moles"

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THE MOST surprising development in the course of the singling out and victimisation of the 13 socialists from BL's Cowley plant was the attitude of David Buckle, the right-wing Oxford District Secretary of the TGWU.

His main claim to fame is many years of determined witch-hunting against the far left in the union.

On this occasion, however, he played a very different role. It was his powerful defence of the 13 and condemnation of the witch-hunt which defused the situation to some extent at a time when it was becoming very dangerous for the labour movement.

Ho countered the 'infiltration' slander by quoting Thatcher at the Tory trade unionists' conference urging them to 'infiltrate' the unions and win support for the Tory party. He asked how many of such people had been sacked.

Appalled

He strongly attacked the media: "There has been no natural justice tor these people, who have been tried and found guilty by the media. As a magimedia conductalle reep the • in response to question from the press, he said he could "smell fascism around in this country"

Such comments from someone like David Buckle show how deep were the dangers for the workers' movement that had developed at that time. Thatcher and Tebbit were sitting waiting to see what they could utilise for their own anti trade union ends.

Organisations like the Economic League - which had not been prominent for many years - were crawling out of the woodwork to advertise their dirty trade of more systematically and effectively operating the blacklist.

BL had a more fundamental objective. In their opinion they have a serious problem in Cowley, having decided to make it their major area of investment.

The victimisation of 13 socialists from the BL Cowley plant has undoubtedly shocked and worried militants throughout industry.

Without wishing to belittle ne eriousness of the Cowle!

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IN THE aftermath to the massive witch-hunt of socialists in BL's Cowley Assembly Plant, and the campaign built upon it by the press, ALAN THORNETT,, himself politically victimised and sacked by BL, gives his reactions and his view of the wider implications.

They have to deal with the militant tradition of the Assembly Plant.

A decision to pump investment into Cowley (which has an ideal combination of Body and Assembly facilities side by side was also a decision to launch a vicious and protracted war against the trade unions.

For various reasons, not least the Tory offensive and the dramatic sell-outs in BL since 1979 by the trade union leaders, mostly at national level, this achieved a high degree of success. Shop stewards and workers were harassed and intimidated. Militants were victimised, and the shop stewards' committee reduced to a third of its previous size.

By the end of last year BL considered (with some justification) that the exercise had been largely completed.

The remaining stewards had their backs to the wall; massive speed-up had been introduced; and the remaining key agreements, like seniority, had been largely smashed.

However, they were wrong, seriously wrong.

In April the workforce struck over the six and nine minutes hand-washing time. The strength and solidarity of the strike demonstrated that trade unionism and the militant history of the plant were far from dead, and not so easy to kill.

BL's initial response came through the joint inquiry agreed as part of the sell-out of the strike.

by a TGWU bridge plant achieved in the same week as the 13 sackings.

A worker who suffered from dermatitis (contracted on the job) was sacked for 'stealing' two tubs of barrier cream. In fact, the comany had issued him with the = 3: his personal use. and he This report again identified the shop stewards' movement as the problem, It was, they said, the "political opinions" of "certain shop stewards" which were the problem, and a reorganisation of the shop stewards' movement was required.

This response, however, although serious, was never adequate to BL's requirements. They wanted (and still want) a clear-out of those militants who represent and can express the militant history of the plant.

That requirement, more than anything else, determined their response to the "discovery', by whatever means, that a number of socialists and trade union activists had taken jobs in the plant - mostly at the time of the Maestro recruitment.

Many of them had been forced to falsify their application forms to get round BL's discriminatory recruitment procedures.

BL decided, along with the media and the government (who followed the events very closely) that this was the basis for a massive witch-hunt against socialists in industry.

Whilst lyingly saying that they were sacking 13 workers for falsifying their application forms (when they had already identified political ideas as the problem in their report), they deliberately fuelled the political witch-hunt.

Each day for several days the gutter press 'revealed' information (such as details of educational qualifications entered on the application forms) which logically could only have come from management sources.

The press witch-hunt was designed not just to get the 13 sacked - although • management did see that as important in itself - but to discredit and weaken the trade union movement and to create the conditions to sack more people. Since the witch-hunt started, the pressure has increased considerably on militants in BL.

They hoped to discredit socialist ideas ideologically through lies and smears, thereby isolawas taking it home in order to maintain the treatment over the weekend.

When the sacking was confirmed on the Monday morning there was an immediate meeting of the section - no.4 paint shop.

Management, surprised by the strength of rank and file reaction, pressed the local stewards for a return to work pending an appeal. This was also the initial reaction of the convenor and works committee. who advocated following proiedure. This could well have meant involving outside officials and led to a delay of many days or even weeks, thus allowing the issue to cool and making further action very unlikely.

But at the mecting the works committee dropped their opposition to the action, and a motion from a rank and file steward for immediate strike action was carried.

The next day the strikers met in the sewards' hut at 8am to discuss their next move. The convenor. Jack Adams, informed us that the company were refusing to hear an appeal while the strike continued. We replied that we had no objection to an appeal. hut we would not go back while the brother stayed sacked. ting shop stewards from their members - making them look like outsiders or 'moles' working subversively for political ends.

They did the same to me in 1974, and to Derek Robinson in 1979.

Such a witch-hunt says to socialists: If you want to get a job, or keep the one you have got, keep your political ideas to yourself - or, more precisely, don't have any political ideas at all. (The Sun announced that one way to spot a 'mole' is to find anyone who reads the Guardian rather than the Sun!)

It says to other less committed workers: Don't listen to or get involved in politics, and don't become an activist in your Battering ram Thus it was the witch-hunt which was most damaging. Every day that it occupied the front pages, this ideological battering ram was in operation.

For this reason it was a mistake for Stephanie Grant to hold did. Her conferentse were entire ly valid, explaining that as an activist she could not have got a job in any other way. But she gave the press three more days of front pages, which would otherwise have been difficult to sustain. This far outweighed the effect of the points she was able to get across.

Åfter Buckle's speech the headlines faded, but one dimension of the situation was brought into sharper focus — the Labour Party angle, with the l'ory editors' eyes on the upcoming Labour Party conference.

This had been a factor from the outset. Right-wingers like John Golding had been quick to equate so-called "infiltration' into BL with so-called infiltration' into the Labour Party. In other words, people with socialist ideas should be outlawed.

The Sun used its editorial three days running to challenge Neil Kinnock to say where he stood on 'infiltration' into BL.

Eventually we agreed on a good compromise. We would return to work to allow the appeal to proceed, but we would let it be known that we would walk out again for certain if the sacked man was not reinstated by midday - whether or not the appeal had been concluded by THE STRIKE by gardeners in the Tory-ruled London borough of Wandsworth has scored a victory.

The workers were given no contract of employment, no washing-up facilities, no towels or toilet paper. Despite promises, Pritchards granted no paid holidays, no sick pay, no pension. The gross pay is £102 to £117 a week, about £30 less than council wages. Workers were subject to instant dismissal.

There was worse to come. Pritchards quickly ran up a long list of penalties under their contract with the council. And to try to make good the loss, they abolished guaranteed weekly miniThis was too much even for Buckle The Telegraph and the Express carried front-page articles claiming that there were '1000 SL members" 'infiltrated" into the Labour Party, and quoted a Labour Party spokesperson saying that "we have got to deal with them"

Although most of the left press (leaving aside the scurrilous role of Newsline) have roundly condemned the witchhunt - including the Morning Star - there has been some reluctance by prominent labour movement figures coming forward to denounce it.

Ken Livingstone has done so, and so has Eric Heffer, who warned in a letter to Labour Party workers (see page 3) of the dangers of creating an atmosphere in which a McCarthyite witch-hunt could flourish. then.

Just before dinner, we were informed that the brother had been reinstated.

Not a historic victory, perhaps, but it does go to show that even in BL victories can still be won when the workers stand firm, even on just a sectional basis. mum pay for the workers, and replaced it by a piece-rate -which would mean some workers, some weeks, getting less than £10!

The 38 NUPE members walked out and stayed solid. They got excellent support from the local Trades Council, from the council unions, and from publie employees in other parts of London, especially council workers and bus drivers.

Pritchards have now conceded the workers' main demands. They have agreed to pay the old wage rates as a guaranteed minimum (calculated on a daily basis) to underpin the new piece rates.

Eric Heffer is right. The dangers are there. Those concerned for democracy in the Labour Party and the trade unions should make it their duty to stamp out this witch-hunt before any more damage is done.

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Socialist Organiser, 28 Middle Lane, London N8: