Why the NGA knew it was time to fight

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THE NGA is a large craft union whose politics are in many ways right-wing.

In 1971 the union refused to come off the register of unions drawn up by the Heath government under the Industrial Relations Act, on the grounds that de-registration would cause it financial problems. The union was expelled from the TUC, and the experience has left a lasting mark on the NGA.

Since their readmission they have been extremely loyal to TUC policy.

But this was not the main reason why the NGA was more militant than other unions against the Tory anti-union laws.

(It tried to tighten up the Wembley conference platform, and its own formal policy and practical action went way beyond the Wembley eight points).

As general secretary Joe Wade said well before the present dispute: "If new technology comes uncontrolled, if it comes because we did not get the right terms for its introduction, make no mistake about it, it will decimate this union ...

The NGA often quotes the experience of its US counterpart, the International Typographical Union, which has watched its membership collapse from 110,000 in 1967 to 38,000 today - because it lost the struggle over new technology.

Today, most type is set by photo-composition, using typewriter-style keyboard and not the old hot-metal system. Direct use of this by journalists and tele-ad personnel could cut out the middle person and lose thousands of NGA jobs.

The availability and efficiency of new techniques has also led to John Mellroy Joe Wade sprouting of instant-print shop and printing operations in local government, banks, insurance companies, etc tinhouse printing), and, of course, small printing proprietors of the Eddie Shah ilk.

Finally, computer typesetting systems now being introduced throughout the print make the long craft apprenticeships unnecessaryThese factors can be seen at work in the Stockport Messenger dispute. Shah has computer typesetting equipment which is operated by six people straight out of secretarial college. Shah claims they reached a competent level of skill in a fortnight, yet NGA apprenticeships are four years.

Free-sheets

Free-sheet owners, who are mostly tough entrepreneurs new to the industry, are particularly keen to use the new techniques, free of NGA control.

There were about 100 freesheet titles in the early seventies. Today there are nearly 600. In 1972 revenue stood at £5 million. it is now | £136 million, and should million by 1985.

All this with tiny and small overheads.

Provincial newspaper owners have had to respond. Unrestrained competition from freesheets could cause them to fold.

They have replied in two ways. They have bought into the new sectors - Westminster Press, United Newspapers and Thomson have all invested heavily. And they have stepped up the fight to introduce new technology and weaken the NGA in their own firms.

Direct input

More than 20 provincial newspaper groups nave agreement for direct input into a computer by journalists or tele-ad workers - though NGA members still do the final keyboarding into the typesetter. Eighteen months ago the employers' organisation, the Newspaper Society, set mid-1984 as their deadline for eliminating NGA control on the final typesetting.

Richard Storey, chairman of Portsmouth and Sunderland Newspapers,,. has already declared that if there is no agreement by that deadline 15 newspapers are prepared to move unilaterally and print with non-union labour.

In response, the NGA. has tried to "follow the job" and recuit 'white collar' workers. It has sought amalgamation with the NUJ. But most of all it has depended on its still considerable industrial strength and its tradition of centralised discipline.

For the NGA the Tory laws come at the worst of all possible times. Faced with the employers attempt to de-skill their members and break their organisation, they depended more than ever on the closed shop as an instrument of discipline and as a control over the supply of labour. They depend more than ever on the power to boycott work codified in Rule 43 of their constitution: "A member shall not perform any work that has either been received from or is going to an unrecognised office except by permission of the National Council.

A glance at the 1980 and 1982 Employment Acts shows (and the last few weeks have ruthlessly confirmed) that almost all forms of secondary action and trade union boycotts are unlawful. Rule 43 itself is an incitement to break the law!

The 1980 Act makes all closed shops agreed after August that year unlawful unless 80% of those to be covered by the arrangement vote for it in a secret ballot. Provisions of the 1982 Act which will become law this November (if not earlier) will apply this to all closed shops.

This is the background to the firm stand that the NGA took If he was allowed to get away with opening new premises at Bury and Warrington, ripping up union agreemeuts, ignoring the NGA, recruiting non-union labour, training them in two weeks, and paying them between - £40 and £70 below union rates, then he would act as a burning beacon for capitalist emulation.

If Eddie Shah could show two fingers to the NGA, then why shouldn't the Newspaper Society fe illow example? his And not just Newspaper the Society.

Union-free technology, managerial control of labour, lower wage levels, are a glittering prize for the Richard Storeys and the David Dimblebeys. And they are also the long-pursued but elusive Eldorado for the Fleet Street Barons for Matthews and Murdoch.

Outlawed

Appreciating the importance of a fight, the NGA also understood that the legislation outlawed the use of their most effective weapons. If they fought legally then they were backing a loser. As Tony Dubbins pointed out with regard to one aspect of this: The company can transfer the work of the six NGA members on strike from Stockport • to Bury, but the NGA cannot transfer its pickets. In effect it means that for the NGA to obey the law it may have in time to be content with picketing an empty factory at Stockport.

Tony Dubbins Moreover, new laws were coming over the hill which would hit the NGA more than most unions. The NGA chose th = right time to stand and fight. I lut for the TUC leaders no time would ever be right to fight. better housing, announced last week that a further 170,000 households_ equivalent to a population the size of Bradford face homelessness during 1984. Government moves imposing huge cuts in housing expenditure combined with the high level of council house sales — justified by a plea of economic necessity yet contradieted by simultaneous increases in taxrelief to owner-occupiers, particularly the wealthiest mean that local authorities already hard-pressed will have even greater difficulty in trying to cope with this worsening problem:

In a circular this week to the 14 English health regions the DHSS is instructing health authorities to make *better use" of their capital spending in 1984-85 by integrating the coordination and control of the three areas of planning, staff levels, current, expenditure, and capital expenditure - a warning of further reductions to come in NHS staffing levels!

Two civil service unions, the Civil and Public Services Association, and the Society of Civil and Public Servants, last week urged their members in unemployment benefit offices not to co-operate with special investi gation teams starting work this month.

They have given the go-ahead for strike action and pickets to be mounted outside offices from which snooper-squads are operating.

The government announced this new initiative last August aS a further move against what they call fraudulent benefit claims. The union described it as a "cheap political gimmick" to be used to intimidate innocent claimants.

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Socialist Organiser no. 16 ‹ January 12 1984 Pagé

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