We received from a Socialist Standard reader a copy of a statement issued in March 1974 by the Managing Director of IPC Newspapers Ltd. to trade-union representatives, and were asked for our comments. Here is the reply we sent.
Dear Mr—,
Your letter together with Percy Roberts’ statement on behalf of IPC Newspapers Ltd. in his address to Print & Engineering Union representatives in March has been handed-on to my committee and I have been asked to make some comments on the statement.
Firstly I should say that I am not sure of Mr. Roberts’ actual position in terms of ownership within IPC Newspapers Ltd., and as you will see, I have assumed that he does have a stake of some kind and is a member of the capitalist class. It may be that he is in fact a highly paid employee himself, but the basis of my comment will still hold.
I should also point out that I am not in a position to query any of the figures and statistics contained in his statement. I note his very generous offer in the final paragraph to examine the books, but simply have not got the time (and to be honest, the inclination) to take him up. I suspect that most of his employees are in a similar position.
Generally speaking though, whenever a member of the capitalist class wants to “ensure everyone knows the facts” (page 1) you may be certain that the facts he wants his employees to know are those which will form the basis for the defence by the owners against any attempts to increase wages by the workers. This whole statement in fact has been clearly designed for such a purpose. And in addition to the abundance of figures he offers, several veiled threats of redundancies are interspersed to bring the point home.
In the 4th paragraph on page 1 we see the classic appeal by capitalists to placate “rebellious” workers, and to inspire “sensible” workers:
The immediate future is a period of considerable challenge to the industry and to IPC Newspapers. The way in which we work together—management and unions— will decide how successful we shall be.
A Grim Promise
“Succesful” is the key word, and Socialists ask what is meant by it. Success to Mr. Roberts is a bigger profit, success to his workers is specified in items 1 & 2 in his “Implications for the future” (page 8):
- To maintain the present standard of living of our employees.
- To give job security to our employees.
It is to be hoped that those reading these two items fully appreciate what is meant. They mean that those employees who are currently beset by such problems as rent or mortgage payments, shortage of money to purchase clothes, furniture, food and the many other essentials of life: Or those who are currently “going short” of these essentials because they are saving to buy a car, or a refrigerator (or any other of the so-called “luxury” items), that these members of the working class, after the success Mr. Roberts refers to, will be in precisely the same position as they are at present.
Should some employees remain dissatisfied with this, Mr. Roberts will doubtless refer them to the graph re-printed on page 7 showing how far up the wage relativities league table they are. Of course this will not change their problems, or their class position in the slightest. It would be interesting to know how much higher up Mr. Roberts, and the members of the capitalist class, would come were they to be included in such a table.
When the worker is promised job security, he is being given the promise that his employer will continue to dictate to him the hours he keeps, the conditions under which he will work and so on. The employer is also promising that he will continue to exploit the worker. This is soon seen as a most peculiar form of success.
A Look at Profit
You may find in your discussions with your fellows that they may concede these points “in theory” but they will want to be “realistic”. Mr. Roberts is clearly hoping that you will see that he too is trying to be “realistic”, he is appealing to the “common-sense” of his employees. He wants you all to be fair with him, and why shouldn’t he? After all he’s just managed to lose £lm.
But Socialists would ask where is this common-sense in working men who continue to vote for political parties representing the capitalist class. It is indeed a strange state of affairs when we live in a society which is capable of producing an abundance of goods for the benefit of all men, yet that production is restricted artificially because a minority of men and women who form the capitalist class, can see no profit at the end of the day. Workers after all produce all the goods and services, they run the capitalist system from top to bottom, and yet they own virtually nothing of the means of production . . . except their right to defend them in times of war, and the right to be subservient to them in times of peace.
The figure which Mr. Roberts places a lot of emphasis on (and quite rightly, as he is the Managing Director) is that of total profit. It appears, though it is by no means made clear, that the figures he quotes (eg: £4,004,000 profit for 72/73) are the gross profits. He goes on to ask rhetorically:
But is £4m a ‘good’ profit on a turnover of more than £60m in the ‘good’ years?
Presumably his employees have enough to worry about already without adding this “problem” to their list. For one thing they should remember that any profit has been created by their own efforts — yet of course, it belongs to the employer (one of the facts that Mr. Roberts is not so anxious for everyone to examine). The employees should not blame themselves too much for only producing a surplus in 1973 of a measly £4m.
The rate of profit for that year would therefore be 6.6% (ie: £4m divided by £60m) and it is true, as Mr. Roberts says, that the Building Societies would have offered a greater % return. However, all industries have varying rates of profit and it is irrelevant for a capitalist to point to other industries where profits are higher for the time being in order to complain about profit rates within his own industry.
Our Practical Suggestion
To be strictly practical, it might be worth remembering that although Mr. Roberts reckons the assets of IPC Newspapers Ltd., have to be “certainly not less than £60m” this sum can only be realized if he can find a buyer. Assuming that there are other capitalists drifting around with £60m to spend, would they purchase his assets? It seems likely, after all his depressing talk, that they would be more attracted by the thought of putting it into the Building Societies themselves!
You might ask your fellow workers how this £60m of assets came to be accumulated in the first place. It is capital amassed over the years by the continual process of exploitation.
Perhaps your fellows would be interested to know the rate of exploitation in 1972/3. Although the rate of profit is 6.6%, the rate of surplus-value (ie. the rate of extraction of unpaid labour) is a far higher percentage:
Wages & Salaries £22,345,000Profit £ 4,004,000
The rate of exploitation = Profit divided by Wages, i.e. 17.9%.
The Socialist Party of Great Britain as you will probably know, takes no part in supporting the interests of one section of workers against one set of employers, or vice versa. The document which you have sent can only be examined by us for what it is, a shot in the class war. We represent the political interests of the working class as a whole and do not activate for employers to lower profits from 2z to lz any more than we exhort workers to try to attain 4y wages where before they only had 3y wages. An above-average wage in one industry necessarily implies a below-average wage in another. We are opposed to capitalism as a whole, high profits or low profits, high wages or low wages.
Unfortunately it is the belief of many individual workers that the most positive step they can take in life is to constantly struggle for higher wages. It is no end in itself, and while workers persist solely in such a struggle and ignore Socialist ideas, they help to perpetuate capitalism.
Only with the introduction of Socialism will the problems of capitalism end. You might (if you have not already) ask your fellow workers why they do not help to introduce Socialism. If they tell you that they do not think it will work, you may show them that they are already making a social system work, and one which runs against their own interests. Mr. Roberts could testify to this; he had £4m worth of evidence to show for it in 1973. Are your fellows incapable of making society work in the interests of all? We have been asking for some time that they give it real thought.
Yours fraternally,
Alan D'Arcy
for the Socialist Standard Editorial Committee.
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