Editorial: Big or Little Unions? (1937)

Editorial from the July 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. W. J. Brown, the Secretary of the Civil Service Clerical Association, has thrown a bombshell into the Trade Union world by telling the busmen that if they decide that they cannot rectify their unsatisfactory position in the huge Transport and General Workers' Union, as disclosed by the recent strike, he will help them form a Union of their own, under their own control (News Chronicle, June 19th, 1937). When Big Unionism was all the rage after the War it was widely believed that you only had to merge a lot of small Unions into one big one to solve all problems and remove all difficulties. It has not turned out quite like that. For one thing the huge organisations have become very slow moving and cumbersome—this, maybe, is unavoidable— and they have not by any means got rid of the sectionalism of the different groups. Consequently much of their energy is absorbed in the constant effort to prevent some sections from being too belligerent, and thus draining away funds in strikes, and preventing the same or other elements from breaking away as a result of craft disputes with other sections of the membership. The moral —pointed out by Socialists at the time—is that you cannot get rid of the reactionary ideas of small bodies of workers simply by lumping them together in a large body, though it is fairly obvious that it is better to try to settle disputes between groups of workers inside a large Union than allow the employers to exploit the rivalries of a number of small, hostile Unions.

On the whole, and Mr. Brown rightly declares his preference for this solution of the problem, it is better to set about the task of democratising the organisation of the large Unions so that they can act quickly and can avoid laying themselves open to the charge that they neglect the interests of sections of the membership. The larger part of the problem is, however, the education of the whole membership, so that they realise their common interests as members of the working class, and so that they cease to think as busmen, dockers, clerks, and so on, but as men and women with the united aim of resisting the pressure of the capitalist class, and of working for the abolition of the capitalist system.

This much can be said for Mr. Brown, though we do not like his politics, that in his own Union of many Civil Service grades he has never been accused of lack of aggression in his attitude to their employer, the Treasury and Government, or of neglecting the interests of sections of his own membership. On the other hand, he has been charged by other bodies of Civil Servants with showing little regard for the interests of grades outside the ranks of his own Association. To which he could, no doubt, reply that that is inevitable so long as the mass of workers are lacking in a sense of their common interest as members of the working class and, consequently, go on thinking wholly or mainly about what they hope they can get by concentrating on a narrower interest.

One thing is quite certain. Mere breakaway Unions solve nothing. If the formation of big Unions did not do much to alter the outlook of the members, merely splitting them up again will do less. The need both in the big and the little Unions is for more class-consciousness and more appreciation of the necessity of the members themselves keeping full control over policy.

Blogger's Notes: 

See the following article from the same issue of the Socialist Standard, 'The ’Bus Strike—and After', for more background on the 'bus workers and their union, the TGWU.

Beneath this editorial was the following notice.

Trade Union Branches 

The Socialist Party of Great Britain is prepared to consider applications from Trade Union and other organisations for a representative to state the case for Socialism. Travelling expenses only are required.

The ’Bus Strike—and After by a 'Busman (1937)

From the July 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

On May 28th the London 'busmen returned to work. After four weeks of determined effort they resumed without having achieved their object—a 7½-hour working day.

Despite the fact that on May 25th a full delegate conference of the 'Bus Section of the Transport and General Workers’ Union had resolved by 40 votes to 9 to continue the strike for the 7½-hour day, the following day the Union Executive withdrew the powers granted to the Section and ordered a resumption of work. The ’busmen, somewhat taken unawares, and with no time to give detailed consideration to the position, returned unanimously. Dissatisfaction with the step taken by the Executive was expressed in most branches, and the E.C., fearful of a loss of membership, posted to the members of the ’Bus Section a comprehensive document explaining the reasons for its action. The reasons were that the strike could not be allowed to drift on to disaster, with the loss of the substance already obtained.

A few days later the Executive took the further step of suspending all Central ’Bus Committeemen, Garage Representatives, District Committeemen, Disciplinary Board Representatives and Schedule Sub-committee Officers pending an enquiry into the actions of certain members during the dispute.

Following this, the London ’busmen received by post a copy of a new agreement, which has been signed and accepted on their behalf by the Union President and General Secretary without reference to their wishes on the matter.

Next, members of the Central ’Bus Committee were summoned before a Union enquiry tribunal, charged with conduct which was not compatible with membership of the Union. Some branch officials were unable to obtain leave to attend to Union business, thus to a great extent suspending the local representative machinery and embarrassing the members who are on trial.

Although there may have been justification for the action taken by Union E.C., yet that E.C. cannot escape some of the responsibility for having brought about the conditions which made its action advisable. If, as was claimed on May 14th by the General Secretary, Mr. Bevin, the Transport Board had given its final reply and there was no possibility of gaining more than was offered then, even though the strike should be extended t« other sections of the Union, there appears to be no reason why the order to resume work should have been delayed for another fortnight. Unless, of course, the E.C. did not consider it possible to take such a step just then. On May 25th, when the number of garages which were prepared to consider a settlement on a basis which did not include the 7½-day, had grown from three to nine, then it was possible to order the resumption of work.

In the meantime, certain members of the Central ’Bus Committee, and some others, mostly members of the Rank and File Movement, had played into the hands of the E.C. by acting very indiscreetly in dealing with the dispute. So, fully armed, the Executive is in a position to purge the ’Bus Section of the so-called “ Red element ” within its ranks.

The cry has gone up, “Bevin must go!” We, of the Socialist Party, hold no brief for Mr. Bevin, but we must point out that merely to replace one General Secretary by another will not solve the difficulties. No matter who holds such a post, if he must negotiate agreements with employers the result may be less than is possible in the limits placed by capitalism, but it certainly cannot be more. The only remedy for getting less than is possible is an alert and understanding membership which keeps continuous control over Union policy.

Mr. Bevin has lost the confidence of many of the ’busmen, and in consequence his relations with the Transport Board are made awkward. Now he has made a desperate bid to consolidate his position, both by discrediting his critics and by withdrawing from the 'busmen their democratic control over their own Section.

This position is arrived at in Trade Unions, as has been pointed out, because the majority of Trade Union members do not understand the functions and limitations of Trade Unionism.

The struggle between employer and worker is inherent in the capitalist system. So is the discontent of the workers. Their discontent goads them on in the struggle, but until they are fully conscious of their class status they conduct the struggle blindly. Individuals in the Trade Unions who make extravagant promises frequently get elected to prominent positions, only to find that capitalism sets a limit beyond which they cannot go. Their promises unfulfilled, these individuals fall into disfavour, and they have to seek ways and means of maintaining their positions or alternatively they make way for new men.

If the workers fully realised that Trade Union activity can at the most serve only to defend the workers' wages and working conditions against the ceaseless pressure of capitalism, these promises would fall on deaf ears. It would then be understood that there are definite limits to what can be achieved and that loud-mouthed orators do not make any difference to the facts. It would be understood why, in one long procession, men have passed from the ranks to official positions, only to lose their “Red" ideas and to become either tame “yes ''-men or ardent reactionaries.

From such an understanding it is but a step to the recognition of our claim that the only way to solve the evils and problems of capitalism, and to end the class struggle, is to abolish class society altogether.

Whilst class society remains, the working class cannot help but struggle, and the degree of their success will be influenced by their understanding of their class position and the control which they maintain over their organisations.

Failure to recognise and act on this makes the task of spreading Socialist ideas more difficult. The workers become apathetic, and useful avenues for propaganda are closed.

W. Waters.

There'll be another one along in a minute (1995)

From the June 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Chelmsford 105

At the end of March a demonstration, addressed by Bill Morris of the TGWU and John Monks, the TUC General Secretary, was held to protest at the plight of the Chelmsford bus drivers who last November were subject to the despicable but predictable anti-working-class action by the now private bus company, Eastern National, owned by the Badgerline Group of Companies. One hundred and five of them were sacked. The drivers had been using normal industrial procedures to support their grievances, these were soon exhausted and a ballot was held which gave a 74 percent majority vote in favour of strike action. The drivers were warned by the management that if they proceeded with their strike they would all be sacked. This was apparently written into their contract of employment. They went ahead with the strike with the full support of the union—and were sacked.

The TGWU bulletin, circulated in the Chelmsford local papers, rightly points out that the fight for reinstatement is fast becoming a historic dispute, and that it has highlighted the class bias of our laws which allows management to sack workers for taking a few hours perfectly legal industrial action.

We have seen many times the type of anti-working-class action practised here by Eastern National. Even before strike action was taken the bus company had organised advertisements for new drivers in the local press and made arrangements for the transfer of drivers from other Badgerline companies in other parts of the country, at great expense to the company. It is blatantly obvious that their aim was to destroy all effective organised union activity in order to impose worse conditions of employment on all Badgerline workers.

Some of the “Chelmsford 105”, as they have been called, have set up a rival bus company with the assistance of the TGWU and are operating alongside the larger bus company’s buses offering a free service. The aim is to disrupt the Eastern National service as much as possible by eventually matching their service bus-for-bus and hitting them where it hurts the most—financially.

The chance of this having the required effect and getting Eastern National to decide to reinstate the sacked drivers is very slim. So what is the logical outcome for this reasonably successful new bus service if not to convert a free service into a commercially-run concern?

We would then have competition between two business organisations both clambering for a share of a limited market Even now we have competition between union members in both organisations, both fighting for their own interests.

The drivers, who were very unfairly dismissed (but legally correct in the eyes of the law) arc obviously very critical of the methods adopted by the managing director of Badgerline, Mr Orbell. But if in the day-to-day running of any new rival bus company it became necessary to cut costs and increase productivity to retain the correct profit margin, how would the new management cope with this type of problem? Would they not have to make the same sort of decisions as the bigger bus company?

The new management may say: we would certainly not run our company the same way as Eastern National, we would be much more interested in the welfare of the employees. In other words, they would be "good" capitalists. This might even happen for a brief while, but what would happen when the competition hots up or another recession bites into the profits? The new management would have to do all that is in their power to preserve the profits of the company—it is the only way it can operate, if it wants to survive. This is the basis of the capitalist system.

Continuous quest for profit

This continuous quest for profit drives all business organisations to the most despicable anti-working-class tactics. This drive for profit is what makes people compete; business against business plying for the same trade, worker against worker fighting for the opportunity to be employed. All the good intentions in the world will not make the capitalist system operate in the interest of all the people

We need to understand how the capitalist system works against our interests and that the only way to achieve a life where we are able to contribute our energy, skills and talents and share the wealth of the world, is to replace the system of competition we are presently forced to suffer. We need to totally adjust our way of life, and establish socialism and do away forever with competition and concentrate on a life of co-operation. We can do this by running society, exactly as we all do now, but in the interest of us all and not the few fortunate enough to own it.

Allan Goldsmith

Letter: A Critic of the Busmen (1949)

Letter to the Editors from the May 1949 issue of the Socialist Standard

East Ham, E.6.

Dear Sir,

I am not a member of your party, or any other party, so perhaps it is not quite in order that I as a very ordinary individual, should write you.

Somehow or other your Socialist Standard booklet has found itself inside my letter box, and I commenced to read the Busmen’s Case.

The Busmen’s behaviour on that Saturday afternoon was the meanest rotten trick they could play on the long suffering public and it certainly earned them the public’s disgust, not its sympathy. Many people had to walk home in the drizzling rain and the ordinary worker was debarred his Saturday sport.

These strikes don't affect people with cars, it only causes them amusement; and after all, these men know all the facts having to work on Saturday and accept them as a condition of employment. They don’t work any longer hours than the average man and have a rest day thrown in.

Supposing the surgeon of a hospital was doing a vital operation and it was past one o'clock midday, would he down tools unless he was paid time and a half The ambulance man, the nurses, postmen. Everybody who is a public servant.

Yours seems to be a one-sided policy, take all, give nothing. If men want to strike let them strike for their suffering wives, who for nearly ten years have had to put up with a ration book and pay the prices what's asked, because it means going without, if you don't

Be men and strike to bring down prices and better food.

They certainly would earn the women’s praise and uphold them in their convictions.

Yours truly,

Margery Anderson.

Reply.

Our correspondent states that she commenced to read the article on the London Busmens’ half-day strike in our February issue. It is a pity that she did not complete the reading. Had she done so she would have found the answer to most of the points that she mentions.

We have not sufficient space to repeat the article in detail, but we will briefly touch on a few points. Before giving vent to her "disgust” at strikers, we suggest that our correspondent considers the fact that a strike is the expression of a struggle between opposing interests and the responsibility for any inconvenience caused is as much, if not more, with the employer as with the workers. But despite her disgust she urges men to strike for their "long suffering wives" and to “strike to bring down prices.” Would a strike to bring prices down to the limits of the wage packet cause less inconvenience than a strike to bring wages up to the level of prices?

The statement that “these strikes don’t affect people with cars” is meaningless. Neither do they affect people with pedal cycles. If our correspondent means that the capitalist is not affected, we already said that in the article.

She says that the busmen know the facts of Saturday work and accept them as conditions of employment. Sure they do. They also know the rates of pay that the job carries. But we venture to suggest, that if busmen, or any other workers, accepted rates of pay that were agreed upon at the times when they took their jobs years ago, their "long suffering wives” would be more disgusted than is our correspondent. Conditions change and workers must continuously struggle to adjust their wages and conditions of employment to the changed conditions in their industries and the world around them. The busmen did not protest at Saturday work. They asked for more pay for more work done.

The supposition about a surgeon proves nothing. Surgeons, like other workers, strive to get the best price for the energies that they sell. If they are not prepared to accept the price currently obtainable, they do not do the job. Like anyone else they must live, and that factor may force them to accept lower rates than they would wish, but they have their union and their means of struggle. The following extract from The Star 29/3/49) proves that. Referring to a meeting of the "Doctors’ Parliament” in London to discuss amongst other things, insufficient pay, The Star says: “Buckinghamshire delegates agreed to urge the meeting to call for mass resignations from the Health Service unless adequate fees were granted.” Where a section of the workers are poorly organised or do not wage a determined struggle, their working conditions are also poorer. That is one reason why the nursing profession that our correspondent uses as an illustration, has been notorious for its low pay and bad conditions of employment.

Is our policy one-sided? There was no reference to our policy in the article under discussion. Our Declaration of Principles will be found on the back page of each issue of this journal.

"If men want to strike” begins a sentence. They don’t want to do anything of the sort. If wives are to pay the prices that our correspondent complains about, then men are forced to strike to get the necessary wage or, as she correctly puts it, "it means going without if you don't.”

W. Waters.

The London Bus Strike (By A Busman) (1954)

From the November 1954 issue of the Socialist Standard

On October 18th, London was in the grip of an ever spreading bus strike. As each issue of daily and evening newspapers reported more and more garages affected and more services withdrawn, so the streets of London became increasingly crowded with motor cars and other vehicles and extra police had to be detailed for traffic control.

The strike, which by October 18th embraced 43 out of 84 Central London bus garages was the boiling over of a feeling of resentment that has been simmering amongst busmen for a long time. An understanding of the position requires a review of bus worker's history over the past 15 years.

Before the 1939-1945 war London busmen received a wage above the average paid to workers in other industries throughout Great Britain. They attained this position by their ready willingness to struggle and the favourable position of their industry. A passenger transport strike represents a dead loss of income to the employers. A stock of passenger rides cannot be built up in preparation for a strike and travellers do not take two rides in the place of one after the strike in order to recoup the employers for the loss. Further, it has a damaging effect on other industries.

During the war busmen were urged to sacrifice some of their working conditions in favour of the war effort. They anticipated that, after the war, they would not only regain the things they had sacrificed but receive many improvements in addition. They formulated a programme of demands which became known as the “Post War Policy,” to be achieved when the time was opportune. The time has never been opportune. With other workers, they were told that the country had to be put back on its feet, export markets had to be captured, the dollar gap had to be closed and the London Transport undertaking was financially “in the red.” There were no end of reasons advanced in favour of wage freeze and wage restraint and why the time was not opportune. A number of minor concessions were gained, an extra quarter time for Sunday work, 9d. per hour for Saturday afternoon work (see Socialist Standard, February, 1949), plus a few pay increases of 7/- or 8/-, the last of which was awarded at the beginning of this year. With the ever increasing cost of living the busmen have found that, despite their pay increases, they have been getting poorer and poorer.

This has resulted in a heavy staff wastage which the employment of more women conductors has failed to reduce. The wastage has become accelerated during recent years. British Transport Commission reports show that during a four year period ending 1952, 25.485 drivers and conductors left their jobs and from January 1st, 1952, to January 1st, 1953, there was a net decline in staff 1,012. In a sellers' market the opportunity was present for busmen to gain a higher price for their labour power.

The gaps in the bus services caused by this staff shortage have been partially filled by busmen working excessive overtime, an opportunity which many of them seized to build up their meagre pay packets. Early this year the busmen began to realise that they were missing a favourable opportunity and that whilst they contented themselves with getting extra pay for working seven days a week plus other forms of overtime, they were solving the London Transport Executive's staff problem and missing the boat that could provide them with improved wages and working conditions.

A ban on rest day and extra duty work was imposed at a few garages and gradually spread throughout the London bus fleet until it embraced almost 90 per cent. of the 114 garages and trolley bus depots. A demand for a £10 10s. weekly wage for all sections (Country Service sections now get a much lower wage than Central London busmen), a five day 40 hour working week and payment during periods of sickness became a rallying point.

The London Transport Executive claimed that this demand was far in excess of anything that they could concede and, although they made certain proposals for a longer working day with increases in overtime pay, they would not negotiate whilst the overtime ban was in operation. Then, without consultation with the men's Trade Union representatives and in a most provocative manner, they introduced into a few garages, a set of schedules that made drastic cuts in a number of bus services. This put the spark to the tinder and garage after garage came out on strike, many without the new emergency schedules coming out in support of those which had them.

The busmen are now claiming that workers in other industries have forged ahead of them and that the inconveniences of their job are not compensated for by the wages they receive. For getting out of bed during the small hours of the morning one week and getting home during the small hours of the morning the following week, for having irregular meal reliefs and a disrupted home life a bus conductor receives a basic wage of £7 14s. 6d. for a 44 hour week—a driver gets 4s. extra. Only by working on Saturday afternoons, on Sundays and national holidays and by performing irksome spreadover duties, can a man get his wage over the £8 mark. A high physical standard is demanded of new recruits but sickness is not catered for—no work, no pay, is the principle. A new contributor pension scheme, recently introduced, is so meagre that it is a matter for ridicule. Annual holidays must frequently be taken during the least pleasant months of the year. The system of rest days makes it necessary to work seven consecutive days before a busman gets a day off except when he has a series of Sundays free from work.

That was the case the London busmen were making on October 18th. A conference was called that day and the delegates from the garages decided by a heavy majority vote to call for a resumption of work and the lifting of the overtime ban in order to have the emergency schedules withdrawn and to allow negotiations to commence with the submission of a claim for higher wages, regulated overtime, to level up the rates of pay between the Central and the Country Services (the Red and the Green) and a number of other items.

The overtime ban had been welded into a strong weapon and it gave the busmen the initiative in the struggle. The introduction of the emergency schedules, by precipitating a strike put the busmen on the defensive and gave the L.T.E. the initiative. Whether it was consciously devised by the L.T.E. or not, it was an astute move and the busmen were snared. Now they impatiently await the outcome of the negotiation.

As with every other commodity, the price of labour power fluctuates with variations in supply and demand, but the fluctuations are not automatic. They are brought about by the efforts of employers to obtain cheap labour power when the supply is plentiful and by the struggles of workers to get more when the demand exceeds the supply. London busmen are working on sound lines in using the present high demand for their particular brand of labour power to force up its price.

As usual there are no end of well wishers and advisers who have cures for the case. Harry Pollitt and Arthur Deakin are for once in agreement in expounding a cure. They both accept that the financial position of the London Transport Executive precludes a satisfactory settlement to the busmen's claims. Some means must be found to improve this financial position and they both speak for a reduction in the fuel tax which would free the L.T.E. from a heavy burden of taxation and release a large sum of money which could be utilised to reduce bus fares and increase busmen's pay. This is an old, old, stinking red herring that dates back to the days of the agitation for the repeal of the Corn Laws. One section of the capitalist class considers itself unjustly treated in relation to another section and enlists the aid of the workers to secure advantages for itself. In the early days of the 19th century it was the heavy tax on com that was supposed to weigh heavily on the workers by keeping up the price of bread. Repeal the Com Laws, they were told, and bread will be cheaper and your wages will buy more. They fell for it. The Com Laws were repealed after years of effort and the workers had to fight against the drive to reduce their wages as soon as there was a tendency for the cost of living to fall. The position will be no different for London busmen. If a reduction in the fuel tax was achieved they would still have to fight to get higher wages.

Incidentally, the London Transport Executive have indicated that they are not interested in a reduction in the fuel tax. When a proposal was made to them by the Transport and General Workers' Union to use the backs of bus tickets to publicise a campaign for fuel tax reduction, they replied that they were a section of the British Transport Commission which relied mainly on railways for its revenue. A fuel tax reduction would assist their competitors, the road haulage companies, to more successfully compete with the railways.

A reduction in the amount of interest paid to bondholders by the Government and collected by them from the British Transport Commission is another proposal to put money into the Commission's coffers and so make higher wages for its employees possible. It is not unknown for a Government in such a case to waive part of the interest charge payable by a nationalised industry, but this would mean higher taxation so that the Government could continue to meet its own legal obligations to the former shareholders now holding Government stock. It would, however, not in the least lessen the efforts of the Board and the Government to keep wages down as much as possible. The general body of capitalists paying the increased taxation would press for lower fares and freight charges not higher transport wages.

The Press has been mildly sympathetic to the busmen. There are many who say that the busmen have a good case, but . . and the “but” evolves into a variety of schemes to get more out of them. One scheme in the forefront is to introduce one-man-operated buses on a wider scale. They have already been introduced in places on the outskirts of London and in the provinces. One man only is required to drive the vehicle and to collect fares, attend to the safety and comfort of passengers and, in general, conduct the bus. Some development of this nature is to be expected for it has ever been a rule of capitalism that, when the employers are forced to pay higher wages they look around for ways and means to reduce their total wage-bill by the introduction of labour saving machinery. That ultimately means, not less labour for all workers, but more labour for some and enforced idleness for others popularly known as a slump.

It may seem to busmen and all other workers that the position is impossible of improvement. Not so. There may be improvements for some of the workers for a long time and for all the workers for a short time, but the range of all improvements is very limited within capitalist society. Not a reduction in the amount of interest paid on investments but the abolition of investment; not struggles for higher wages but the end of the wages system; not joint consultation between employers and employees, but the elimination of employment and unemployment, a world wherein everyone produces to his best ability and has access to the wealth produced, in a word—Socialism. That is the only alternative to an indefinite continuation of the struggle to get enough to live on for those millions who constitute the working class.

Busmen have always had one weakness in their struggles—inter-garage rivalries, inter-section suspicions, inter-service jealousies and a lack of close communication to allow of concerted action. The overtime ban did much to overcome those difficulties and give a common purpose. The strike, as it was not complete, has recreated the difficulties. To achieve Socialism there must be a breaking down of the rivalries and antagonisms between all workers in all industries and a unification, on the political field, on the basis of a clear understanding and awareness of their interests—AS A CLASS.

W. Waters.

Laboured love (2020)

Book Review from the November 2020 issue of the Socialist Standard

Love and Labour. (Red Button Years – Volume 1). By Ken Fuller. ISBN: 978-1-6990-9278-1. 2019.

As there is no publisher accredited, we presume this is a self-published book. The author lists seven other books, six being non-fiction. One of them, ‘Radical Aristocrats: London Busworkers from the 1880s to the 1980s’, published by Lawrence and Wishart in 1985, provided the basis for this story.

Self-publishing has become widely available due to technological advances making it much more affordable. It is an avenue for authors of books, fiction and non-fiction, with such limited appeal as to be unlikely to generate profit enough, or even at all, to interest commercial publishers.

This must not be taken to imply such books are badly written, but rather their appeal is to a limited audience due to the subject matter. The weakness of the process can be the absence of the critical eye of an experienced editor. Such is my the overall impression of this novel.

There can be no doubting Ken Fuller’s immersion in the subject on which he writers. A former bus driver and full-time officer in the Transport and General Workers Union, he has dedicated much of his life to exploring and recording the history of this element of trade unionism, with specific reference to London. Perhaps he is too close to his subject.

A basic tenet of writing good fiction is ‘show, don’t tell’, engage the reader, invite the reader to construct mental scenes, challenge those constructs through the story taking unexpected turns. Reading should be an active process.

Unfortunately, this novel does an awful lot of telling. There is page after page of what reads like verbatim minutes of union meetings. Anyone who has been active in a union will recognise how drawn out and, frankly, tedious, even though important, such meetings can be. Especially so for someone on the outside glancing in.

Fuller does not seem clear as to his intention. As a chronicler of London bus workers’ history he has undoubtedly a creditable depth of knowledge. He is also keenly aware of the wider contexts in which that history flowed its course.

However, to make sure no research goes to waste, characters find their mouths being over over-stuffed with historical details. They don’t so much have conversations so much as swap lectures. For example, George Sanders, a union official, delivers an impromptu potted history of London Transport companies, along with American influence and dividend returns while standing, supposedly chatting, at Hyde Park Corner.

The novel opens in 1913 and works its way through to 1917. Its two main characters are Mickey Rice, erstwhile tram driver in Reading who becomes a bus conductor, then driver, in London, and Dorothy Bridgeman.

Dorothy has fled a privileged, but stifling upbringing, to become a radical socialist in what would become the Leninist sense. Dorothy and Mickey become lovers as well as union comrades and we are treated to a number of their explicitly erotic scenes.

The first of these is revealing (sorry) in that mid-coitus Mickey and Emily, the name Dorothy was using at the time, engage in a discussion on the radical, or otherwise, nature of impromptu sex. Emily (Dorothy) concludes, it is ‘…no threat whatsoever to the bourgeois order – unless, that is, they also embrace the class struggle.’ (Page 52).

Both are fictional characters, but many others are historical personages. As such they serve to give voice to the competing elements within the burgeoning Red Button, a reference to the badge worn by bus workers’ union members, union.

Dorothy takes the story off into London’s seriously impoverished East End when she meets and allies herself with Sylvia Pankhurst, who has split from Christabel and Emmeline who betray themselves by becoming purveyors of white feathers activists as they aid the war’s recruiting drive.

Dorothy ends up in Holloway after indulging in the suffragette habit of smashing windows; a hammer being more effective than a rock, Sylvia opines. This leads her to conclude that breaking windows changes nothing.

The First World War does energise the novel, especially the accounts of those trying to stop workers killing each other on behalf of capital. The danger this invites in a jingoistic atmosphere is explored and does point up that the war effort was not universally popular.

Fuller explores how circumstance, especially extreme circumstance, can affect an individual. When Dorothy is killed by a German bomb, Mickey seriously considers enlisting. He is eventually talked out of it by Dorothy’s ‘ghost’ as his own conscience and political consciousness manifest through his memories of her voice.

The politics of the novel focus on the role of the British Socialist Party, the Labour Party and the ILP. There is a Leninist thread represented by the character Rothstein, but the main focus is on the union and competing factions within it.

A familiar story of the left-right dichotomy, still playing out over a hundred years later. The pro- versus anti- war elements give expression to this, and there is some understanding of how capitalism is the root cause of war. There is no mention that in the ten years leading up to the war’s outbreak the Socialist Party of Great Britain had consistently voiced this point.

Indeed socialism, as dealt with in this book, is to be achieved via reformism or some Bolshevik-style revolution. That the working class will have to look beyond trade unions and political parties vying for power and achieve socialism through its own conscious action is not addressed.

Any undertaking on the scale of this novel is admirable. It appears to me, though , there is a much better novel in here begging to be revealed. I started This review began by invoking the role of the editor. If the book was 200 pages shorter it would be 200 pages better.

‘Love and Labour’ is a labour of love on the author’s part, and also the reader’s. Dispense with the potted histories, the detailed accounts of union machinations and let the story emerge. Dorothy and Mickey are strong characters, but even they are too often recruited as mouthpieces for the author.

Dave Alton

Blogger's Note:

Ken Fuller's book, Radical Aristocrats: London Busworkers from the 1880s to the 1980s, was reviewed in the April 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard. It was of particular interest to Socialist Standard readers 'cos a couple of SPGBers, Frank Snelling and Bill Waters, were active in the Busworkers' rank and file movement in the 1930s.

On the SPGB website, Ken Fuller replied to the above review. Reproduced in full below:

The author the book “Love and Labour” has sent in this reply:

Dear Comrade,

I was in two minds whether to respond to your review of my novel, Love and Labour, but decided that, in view of the fact that your reviewer gets certain details wrong, I should do so.

Your reviewer is of the view that the novel would have benefited from the services of an expert editor. Maybe so, but he seems to have missed the point, as what he describes as “union machinations” constitute one of the major themes of the book. (An expert editor could also have eliminated the several typos which disfigure the review.)

Most damningly, however, there is evidence that your reviewer gave but cursory attention to the book. For example, he complains that George Sanders, while standing at Hyde Park Corner, goes into great detail concerning the history of the Traffic Combine, even to the extent of mentioning the rate of dividend. Well, no. In fact, Sanders is driving Dorothy Bridgeman to her interview for a job at the London General Omnibus Company, where she will gather intelligence for the red-button union. Surely it is reasonable in these circumstances for Sanders to voice his concern that the profits of the LGOC (with its 20 percent dividend) will be used to subsidise the Underground rather than being used to improve the wages and conditions of busworkers!

Then again, your reviewer has Dorothy thrown into prison for breaking windows a la Sylvia Pankhurst. In fact, she ends up in Holloway for throwing rocks at a tram driven by a strike breaker at the tail end of the London Tram Strike of 1915. Given the fact that the account of the tram strike constitutes one of the longest chapters in the book, it is difficult to see how such a mistake could have been made, unless the reviewer’s attention was elsewhere.

Then again, the review mentions in passing “the character Rothstein” with apparently no understanding of the fact that Theodore Rothstein was a towering figure in the socialist and anti-war movements of the period.

I would have posted the above as a comment after the review, but can see no way of logging on, as I am not a member. I would therefore be grateful if you would insert it for me.

Yours fraternally,

Ken Fuller.

50 Years Ago: The London Bus Strike (by a busman) (2004)

The 50 Years Ago column from the November 2004 issue of the Socialist Standard

On October 18th, London was in the grip of an ever spreading bus strike. As each issue of daily and evening newspapers reported more and more garages affected and more services withdrawn, so the streets of London became increasingly crowded with motor cars and other vehicles and extra police had to be detailed for traffic control. The strike, which by October 18th embraced 43 out of 84 Central London bus garages was the boiling over of a feeling of resentment that has been simmering amongst busmen for a long time ( . . . )

    

As with every other commodity, the price of labour power fluctuates with variations in supply and demand, but the fluctuations are not automatic. They are brought about by the efforts of employers to obtain cheap labour power when the supply is plentiful and by the struggles of workers to get more when the demand exceeds the supply. London busmen are working on sound lines in using the present high demand for their particular brand of labour power to force up its price ( . . .)

   

It may seem to busmen and all other workers that the position is impossible of improvement. Not so. There may be improvements for some of the workers for a long time and for all the workers for a short time, but the range of improvements is very limited within capitalist society. Not a reduction in the amount of interest paid on investments but the abolition of investment; not struggles for higher wages but the end of the wages system; not joint consultation between employers and employees, but the elimination of employment and unemployment, a world wherein everyone produces to his best ability and has access to the wealth produced, in a word – Socialism. That is the only alternative to an indefinite continuation of the struggle to get enough to live on for those millions who constitute the working class.

    

Busmen have always had one weakness in their struggles – inter-garage rivalries, inter-section suspicions, inter-service jealousies and a lack of close communication to allow of concerted action. The overtime ban did much to overcome those difficulties and give it a common purpose. The strike, as it was not complete, has recreated the difficulties. To achieve Socialism there must be a breaking down of the rivalries and antagonisms between all workers in all industries and a unification, on the political field, on the basis of a clear understanding and awareness of their interests – AS A CLASS.

(From front page article by W. Waters, Socialist Standard, November 1954)

Matters Underground. (1932)

From the October 1932 issue of the Socialist Standard

Since early this year, a wage cut of 2½ per cent. on all earnings has hung over the heads of the employees of the London Traffic Combine. The need for reducing expenses owing to the crisis, and the falling off of traffic are the reasons given, and a desire to cut the suit to the cloth. In other words the employers are pleading their “poverty.”

It is generally admitted that the Combine is one of the most efficient and prosperous concerns in Britain, but before we condemn the cry of poverty as a fraud, it will do no harm to glance at the results of the past few years. For this purpose we will quote from a pamphlet, “The London Traffic Combine,” issued by the Labour Research Dept., Doughty Street, London, W.C., at the beginning of the year.

Let us take the District Railway first. It does not look too bad: —

                                        1927 1929 1931

Profits in £1,000’s            369   490   458

Dividend %                       4      5             4½

Now for the basis (of control) of the combine —the tubes. Here no competition is to be feared, owing to their enormous cost and the need for Parliamentary powers, hence the dividend hunters and bondholders have swarmed round these like flies. Let us see the dividends paid and net profits of these concerns: —

                                           1927 1929 1931

London Electric               4%     5%   4%

Central London               4%     5%   5%

City & South London       4%     5%   4½%

                                   

                                                Net Profit in £1,000’s

                                             1927 1929 1931

London Electric                633   695   636

Central London                210   188   187

City & South London        131   122   126

Also let us see the percentage of “working expenses per tram-mile” to “traffic receipts” : —

Company                                  C.G.L.   L.E.R. District C.L.R.

1926                                             54    60           68            66

1930                                             59     53½    64            62

Such are the “mounting expenses” of the tubes and their poverty.

Now for the ‘buses; much the same story as before:—

                                                                1927 1929 1931

Profit in £1,000’s                                   608   671   740

Dividend, tax free                                     7%    8%    6¾%

Operating cost % of traffic receipts             94   93.3    93.1

In addition, the Combine has controlling interest in Overground, Ltd., and a working agreement with Tilling & British Automobile Traction Co., Ltd., and in the outer area it formed Green Line coaches to drive other operators off the roads.

Now for the trams. These consist of the London United, Metropolitan Electric, the Tramways (M.E.T.) Omnibus Co., and the South Met. Electric Tram and Lighting Co. All except the last have not paid a dividend on the ordinary shares for some time, probably owing to their being used as feeders to the tubes or the traffic being “squeezed” to the ‘buses; but the last-named concern has, since 1924, paid 5 per cent. This, on the face of it, looks bad, but the company controlling the tram undertakings (the London & Suburban Traction Co.) does not seem to he doing too badly; the profits during the last few years mounting steadily:—1927, £24,920;  1929, £60,864, and 1930, £89,640.

So far in our review, the net profits and dividends on ordinary shares have been shown. There are other shares as well, but we will pass them by for this article and have a look at the debenture holders, whose interest must be met before the others receive anything. In 1931, the L.G.O.C. loan capital totalled £5,561,000, and absorbed £276,500 for the year (4s. 3d. per week for every L.G.O.C. worker). But the tube bondholders draw the lion’s share. They carry a loan capital of over £36-millions, and draw an annual charge of £1,720,000 (or £3 6s. per week for every railman employed on the tubes). In addition, various means of speeding up and displacing workers are being resorted to with the view to increased profits : faster and heavier trams and ‘buses, faster and longer trains, with appliances for doing away with gatemen, liftmen, signalmen, ticket examiners, etc., and in view of this it can be safely said that the Combine’s plea of “poverty” is not made out.

Matters came to a head with a demand for wage reductions and further speeding up during September. The men declare that the speeding up is not safe, but the L.G.O.C. refused to withdraw from the position they had taken up. (Daily Herald, August 25th). After some negotiations the men’s delegates finally agreed by 39 votes to 21 to accept revised terms presented by the Company and recommended for acceptance by the Union. Although the demand for reduced wages was withdrawn, the new speed schedules will themselves involve some reduction in earnings. But according to the Labour Correspondent of the News-Chronicle (September 23rd) no one knows exactly what the effect will be. On one route, however, it is claimed that the new schedules will mean a loss of 8s. a week overtime pay. The Company promise to reconsider the matter in nine months’ time, but what exactly this means is not clear. The men fear that the acceleration will be used to reduce the number of ‘buses on the streets, and that the medical boards will get rid of redundant staffs by scrapping the older men.

We ask the workers in this and every other industry to note that such disputes will happen again and again so long as capitalism is allowed to continue. Why not set about ending the system that robs you ? Come to our meetings, hear our case, and question our speakers.

Get hold of our literature and think it over. Then, if you think we come up to what is required, join us. You will be welcomed, and will find plenty to do in the cause of Socialism. That is the only effective reply to the traffic or any other combine.

C. V. R.

50 Years Ago: Mr Thurtle misfires (1996)

The 50 Years Ago column from the October 1996 issue of the Socialist Standard

Mr. Ernest Thurtle, Labour M.P. for Shoreditch, sometime member of the Fabian Society and I.L.P., and sometime belligerent war-supporter turned pacifist turned war supporter, writes a weekly column of pontifical political comment and behind-the-scenes chit-chat for Beaverbrook’s Sunday Express under the title “ Labour Point of View.” On Sunday, September 1st, he wrote the following: —

"Sympathy for the little fellow struggling against the big one is natural, but in the present dispute between the little and big unions of the transport workers common sense appears to be on the side of the big battalion.

Mr. Frank Snelling, the national organiser of the little union, which is fighting so spiritedly, is what is known in Labour circles as an S.P.G.B’er. Decoded, this means a member of the Socialist Party of Great Britain, a strict Marxist sect of microscopic membership.

Because the little party had so few members, who oozed Socialist self-righteousness, the larger movement was wont to refer to them derisively as the Small Party of Good Boys.”

That is all Mr. Thurtle has to say. He gives no facts about the dispute and no reasons why he believes that all the common sense is on one side. He does not mention that the S.P.G.B. has members in the T. & G.W.U. as well as in the N.U.P.W., and it is evident that his sole object in. referring to the dispute was to provide a peg on which to hang the unoriginal remarks about the S.P.G.B.

[From Socialist Standard, October 1946.]

The Busmen's Problem: New Unions or old (1938)

From the August 1938 issue of the Socialist Standard

Readers of the Socialist Standard will remember the bus strike of May, 1937.

The Busmen's Rank and File Movement, an unofficial “ginger up" organisation, operating within the Transport and General Workers' Union, had secured a majority on the Central Bus Committee, the negotiating committee of the London Bus section of the Union. When the General Executive Council of the T. & G.W.U. granted powers to the Bus section to strike for a 7½ hour day, this committee was the one upon which fell the responsibility for the conduct of the strike. After four weeks the G.E.C. withdrew the powers previously granted and sent the Busmen back to work. An agreement was negotiated on the basis of proposals which the men had rejected only a few days before the end of the strike.

Following the strike an enquiry was held by the union into the activities of certain of the more prominent members of the section with the consequence that a number of the leading Rank and File Movement members were suspended from office and others expelled from the union. These suspensions and expulsions were subsequently endorsed by the 1937 Biennial Conference of the T. & G.W.U.

Mr. W. J. Brown, Secretary of the Civil Service Clerical Association, offered his services to the London Busmen if they desired to form a breakaway union. His offer was rejected by the Rank and File Movement leaders.

Responsibility for the conduct or misconduct of the strike is in doubt. Lacking further evidence there are no grounds for accepting the conflicting statements made by either side. Many Busmen were disgruntled at the treatment they had received, and when, on February 18th of this year, the National Passenger Workers' Union was formed, it was from this disgruntled element that this organisation recruited its membership. The promoters of the N.P.W.U. are, in the main, ex-members of the now disbanded Rank and File Movement. Mr. W. J. Brown is the Hon. President.

In a pamphlet entitled, “A Real Union for Passenger Workers," the promoters of the new organisation state their case. Briefly it is ". . . that the Transport and General Workers' Union has not only not been an asset, but a positive obstacle in achieving a remedy . . ." for the grievances of the Busmen, and that ". . . there is no hope of ever making the Transport and General Workers' Union an effective instrument to this end " (page 13). The existing Central Bus Committee of the T. & G.W.U. replied with a pamphlet, “The T. & G.W.U. IS THE REAL UNION for Passenger Workers," in which it is claimed that “this union IS an effective instrument to this end.” Further literature appeared, but nothing else of much interest was contributed to the argument.

It is not the business of The Socialist Party to take up the cudgels on behalf of either the new Transport Union or the old one, but there are certainly factors relating to this position which require examination in order that the workers may learn from the experience.

For a breakaway union of this kind to be successful, from the Busmens' point of view, the first necessity is that the bulk of the Busmen should pass into it. At no time have there been grounds for expecting to be able to gather all the Busmen into a new organisation. If those responsible for the breakaway considered otherwise they deluded themselves. Alternatively, they must have conceived that the Busmen split into two camps could be no worse off than they were under the leadership of the T. & G.W.U. In fact that is their claim in the pamphlet mentioned. But is this so? If it is, then no harm has been done.

That the London Busmen have grievances which have not been remedied is undoubtedly true, but it is equally true that they have been able to maintain their wages and working conditions at a level which would certainly have been lower were it not for their resistance. This has been made possible by the readiness of the Busmen for united action. Negotiations have often faced them up with the need for united action and their readiness for this has frequently resulted in success. The result of negotiations by a union always reflects the preparedness and the ability of the members to act in unity. If the Busmen have not been involved in a larger number of strikes it is because of this ability to act unitedly that a single organisation has been able to afford them. Negotiations on behalf of a body of men split up into two camps will reflect the weakness that this position gives rise to, since the ability to act unitedly is destroyed. So, with two organisations in existence, antagonistic to each other, the conditions of the Busmen are menaced. Numerous times in the past the London Busmen have been engaged in disputes which have not received the official sanction of the T. & G.W.U., but the Busmen were at no time disunited among themselves. That is why their unofficial strikes have so often been the means of gaining them some slight improvement in their working conditions. Now they are disunited amongst themselves.

If the new organisation can capture the membership then, of course, the split will be healed. But will such a new organisation be able to offer more than the old, or will it embody the same weaknesses? If it can offer more then it is reasonable to expect that in time it will attract all the transport workers to its ranks.

The form which the new organisation would take, assuming, of course, that it secured recognition, would be determined by the circumstances in which it had to work. It would be bound by certain limits, which, if it attempted to go beyond them, would only serve to wreck it. These circumstances under which it would be bound to function are dictated by the needs of the industry. In this instance, by the needs of capitalism organised as a public service.

Recognition must be sought, but will only be conceded if the organisation is capable of disciplining its members and binding them to agreements. Where the membership is taught to expect so much from its leaders, as in the case of the T. & G.W.U., the leader must be in a position to pledge his membership and sign agreements in their name. With any such organisation based on the principle of leadership this must apply. The membership will look for agreements as the result of successful negotiations, with the consequence that the leadership will tend to degenerate into the function of special pleading. It is a matter of time, with developments along these lines, when the new union would become indistinguishable from the old. Leadership is the weakness of the older organisation, it can well become the weakness of the new.

The supporters of the National Passenger Workers* Union claim that permanent officialdom will not be tolerated in that organisation. All officials are to be elected. The constitution of the N.P.W.U. is modelled along similar lines to that of the old London and Provincial Union of Licensed Vehicle Workers. That union was absorbed by the United Vehicle Workers, which eventually amalgamated to form the Passenger Section of the Transport & General Workers' Union. This development was, to an extent, in line with developments in the passenger carrying industry. Attempts to build a new union along the lines of the old Licensed Vehicle Workers' Union should be critically examined to be sure that such a step, instead of being a step forward in working class organisation, is not really a step backward.

The elective principle of securing officials prevailed in the old L. & P.W. of L.V.W., but was not found to be so very beneficial. Negotiators require to have great experience to be able to explore all that an agreement implies. The gaining of such experience is rendered difficult where the elective principle applies. There is the further point that elected officials have to pay much attention to attempts to usurp their positions by other job seekers. Intrigue, scandal and carping criticism are the weapons so often used by would-be officers that the time of an elected officer is all too frequently devoted to combating such schemes as his opponents embark upon in an endeavour to bring him into disrepute with the membership. It is not always the experienced man who gets elected under such conditions, but the most popular man, the man who is often the most unprincipled and unscrupulous.

A full-time official of a union is an employee. A capitalist, when he requires an employee, goes to the labour market and selects the man who is best suited to serve his purpose. He employs the man and dispenses with him when he no longer suits. The trade unions have found this to be the most satisfactory method of staffing their offices. The elected official on the union administration staffs has practically disappeared. On the executive side the elective principle is necessary in order that the organisation shall retain its democratic basis. The Executive Council must always remain an elected body and, as such, it can only reflect the degree of understanding and the amount of activity of the members.

When officials have to go to the membership for re-election they quite often find it to their advantage to keep their members ignorant of many affairs and they find an apathetic membership a great help towards re-election. Active minorities within a union’s ranks are always regarded with disfavour by the official element. Even where active minorities exist, apathetic majorities will often be the means of keeping incompetent and unsatisfactory officials in their jobs. The Vigilance Committees of the old Vehicle Workers' Union found this to be true, as also did the Minority Movement and, later, the Rank and File Movement. Should it be necessary to repeat the lesson ?

One function of trade unions is to endeavour to obtain some security of employment to its members. The members must expect to have to guarantee some security of employment to their officers. An apathetic membership allows officials to entrench themselves in their jobs by surrounding themselves with cliques and by adapting a union’s constitution to suit their purpose. The London Busmen, and, for that matter, the workers as a whole, still appear to want to be led. Thus can more be expected from a new union than can be obtained from an old one? Just a change of leadership with the right to be able to change it again when desired is rather poor satisfaction.

The pamphlet issued by the National Passenger Workers’ Union contains a criticism of the officials of the Transport and General Workers’ Union. It claims that they have done nothing for the Busmen. That means that in maintaining their wages and conditions at the present level, despite attacks by their employers, the Busmen have no one to thank but themselves. It means that the men have by their own effort, and without official aid, been able to defend their position. That being so, there must be scope for the Busmen to express themselves in the Transport and General Workers’ Union. If there is not, then the credit must go to the officials.

We fear that too much is being made of the domestic grievances of the Bus Section of the Transport Union and not enough attention paid to its functional results. The interests of the Busmen are likely to be sacrificed in the struggle over domestic affairs.

Advocates of the breakaway union continually make reference to “progressive unionism.” The impression they convey is that trade unionism can lead to some condition of society wherein the workers’ lot will be a satisfactory one. Trade Unions can be considered progressive in only two senses, in their ability to adapt themselves to the changing conditions of capitalism, i.e., to the growth of Transport Boards, etc., or by their ability to improve the conditions of life of their members. In either direction the T. & G.W.U. can make good claims despite its many faults and weaknesses. As regards a union being progressive in any other sense, those who consider this possible are living in a vacuum. They are Utopians.

Men do not join a union merely because they desire to be members. They join because a union offers them the means of improving their working conditions by collective bargaining. Trade unions exist in conditions where the worker sells his labour power to the capitalist. They serve to regulate the conditions of sale. So long as the worker has to sell his labour power to live, so long will his status be one of an exploited wage slave. No trade union organisation can alter that. The poverty, insecurity and other attendant evils which beset the working class will remain as the source of the grievances which trade unions cannot eliminate, no matter how “progressive” they may consider themselves.

Emancipation for the worker lies in the abolition of the relationship of buyer and seller of labour power. This achieved, then trade unions as a means of regulating this relationship will become redundant.

Arguments are being advanced in favour of a breakup of the existing trade unions in this country. The criticism of the promoters of the N.P.W.U. against the T. & G.W.U. to the effect that the Busmen are at the mercy of the various other trade and industries who constitute the majority of the membership of the older organisation, is partly justified even though exaggerated. With the workers still subjecting their class interests to sectional, trade interests, and with various trades represented in one union, conflict of opinion is sure to arise. The fault lies more in the lack of class consciousness by the workers than in the nature of the union organisation.

The old, old lesson must be repeated. Active minorities cannot push or drag the workers against their will. Impatience to achieve something worth while is admirable, but when it causes men to act prematurely it is often disastrous. Many sincere and hard-working fellows become the dupes of unscrupulous and self-seeking schemers because they are too impatient to spend the time getting down to the task of convincing their fellow workers of the need for a certain line of action.

When the workers give up their sectional outlook and realise that they have a common class interest, then they will establish a new social system in the place of Capitalism, but this will be achieved by political organisation. Until then we suggest that all workers, if faced with a similar position to that of the London Busmen, should look before they leap. They may be acting without due regard to all the circumstances which surround them; just jumping out of the frying pan into the fire.

W. E. W. & F. W. J.

Blogger's Note:

With regards to the authors of this article, 'W. E. W.' was Bill Waters, a longstanding and very active member of the SPGB, who also happened to be a militant rank and file trade unionist in the bus workers' union over many decades. My (educated) guess is that 'F. W. J.' was the initials of Frederick William Johnson who, before joining the SPGB in 1931, was a member of the Communist Party. Johnson retained his membership of the SPGB from 1931 until February 1962, when he had to resign his membership because he emigrated to Australia. Waters also joined the SPGB in 1931 and retained his membership of the Party until his death in 1970. (There's a pitifully short obituary for Waters in the March 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard.)

Why did this particular rank and file union dispute receive so much coverage in the pages in the Socialist Standard? Arguably, it was because there were SPGB members involved in both sides of this union dispute. Though it's not mentioned in the article itself, one of the prominent leaders of the breakaway union was an SPGBer, Frank Snelling. Snelling, a former member of the Socialist Labour Party, was from South London - he originally joined the Tooting Branch of the SPGB in 1929 - and was an on/off member of the SPGB up until he was lapsed from membership in 1952. 

Adam Buick goes into greater detail about this dispute - and the debate amongst party members involved in this dispute - in his review of Ken Fuller's book, Radical Aristocrats: London Busworkers from the 1880s to the 1980s,  which appeared in the April 1995 issue of the Socialist Standard.

Editorial: The Bus Strike (1958)

Editorial from the July 1958 issue of the Socialist Standard

It may seem that a strike lasting nearly seven weeks was a high price for the busmen to pay for the relatively small gains they made in the shape of some increase of pay for the men outside central London who at the start were excluded entirely from the offer of 8s. 6d. increase: though even this was noteworthy in face of the adamant attitude of the London Transport Executive. But the heartening demonstration of working class solidarity by the central London men will have achieved much more. The employers and the government were looking at the busmen’s struggle as a test case for the wage claims in other, larger, industries. Having seen the hundred per cent, solid strike, they will take note that there is a degree of determination behind the claims that they did not expect

The T.U.C. comes out of it badly. Having given verbal encouragement to the busmen’s claim they were too timid to face the prospect of extending the strike and limited their help to an appeal for financial assistance.

The Government cleverly applied their old class principle, "divide and rule,” by detaching the railwaymen from possible involvement in the dispute, with a 3 per cent. wage increase, to be paid for through redundancies and economies. (Readers should turn to another column to see what this journal was saying about Railway Nationalisation 50 years ago.)

Sir John Elliot, chairman of London Transport, showed that a nationalised industry behaves just like employers generally. He was, as he said, being tough, and was apparently prepared to see the buses off the streets till Christmas in order to win. Simultaneously, he announced further contraction of bus services, because they don’t pay their way.

Taken all in all the bus strike was a complete demonstration in tangible, painful form, for everyone to see, that under its thin disguise of “Welfare,” capitalism has not changed from what it always was, a hard, ruthless social system in which the workers are expected to take what capitalism offers and be beaten down if they try to get more.

What is wrong with arbitration? (1958)

From the July 1958 issue of the Socialist Standard

Politicians and newspaper writers who say that they believe in the principle of the right to strike, but who always condemn workers in this country who come out on strike, are fond of saying that strikes aren’t necessary any longer because wage claims can go to arbitration; where, so they say, the claim will receive impartial treatment. As these opponents of strikes are not at all impartial themselves their enthusiasm for arbitration is suspect to start with. But among the workers, too, especially when a strike puts them to great inconvenience, there is a widespread belief that somehow the arbitration courts are, or ought to be, a substitute for coming out on strike.

The idea is that if you have the right sort of men on the arbitration bodies, and supply them with the right sort of supporting evidence, they will argue it out and reach a " just ” solution. But who are the right sort of men and what is a “just” solution? The Tribunals usually consist of a President (with or without two other “ independent ” members), assisted by a member drawn from an employers' panel and a member drawn from a workers' panel.

The employers' and workers' members, and the independent members, no doubt, argue from their respective standpoints about the issues presented, and the award or refusal of an award is in the last resort determined by the independent members Tribunals or the President. While it is assumed that the Tribunals work on such conceptions as a "fair" wage and "what the industry can bear," these are meaningless or vague, and individuals can have their own interpretations. The Tribunals are not (though many people think they are) under specific obligation to try constantly to push wages up, or even necessarily to keep' them in line with the cost of living. Their essential purpose is to secure the settlement of disputes between employers and workers, with particular regard to the fact that if such disputes are not settled, production may be halted through strikes or lock-outs. Where it is a question of workers claiming higher wages one of the things the Tribunal is in effect considering is what price the employers will have to pay to avoid having their business (and their profits) brought to a standstill by a strike. The determination and intensity of feeling of the workers is therefore a factor in the issue.

From the organised workers' standpoint if arbitration bodies are of any use it is due to the fact that behind the workers’ claims is the readiness to strike.

In recent years most wage settlements have been made without arbitration or strikes (though often with the threat of strikes in the background), but these settlements were largely a recognition by the employers of the fact that with rising prices and little unemployment they had to pay more or lose workers to competitors.

Those who oppose all strikes deny that the strike is a necessary weapon for the workers. A case in point was the provincial busmen’s strike in July, 1957. The Unions representing the busmen (those employed by the bus companies outside London) demanded an increase of 20s. to bring them more into line with busmen's pay in London. Having been offered only 3s. they determined to strike. The Minister of Labour then referred the dispute to arbitration and the Industrial Disputes Tribunal awarded 11s. The Daily Telegraph (July 26th, 1957), which had condemned the strike, maintained that the award proved that the busmen would have got 11s. anyway, and that therefore, "the six-day strike is, and was from the first, headstrong, malicious and unnecessary." Of course, the events proved nothing of the kind. If merely stating a case were all that was required to get an 11s. increase, why did the employers refuse to offer more than 3s.? and can it be doubted that in its purpose of getting the dispute settled the members of the Tribunal had to take into account the fact that the men were so determined in their claim, that they had decided on their strike before the reference to the Tribunal, and were still engaged in it while the Tribunal considered the case?

The workers’ victory was rather a vindication of the declaration of Mr. Frank Coyle of the Transport Workers’ Union: "I stand by my previous objection to arbitration in any form.” (Daily Herald, July 17th, 1957. Mr. Coyle made this statement on hearing that the Minister had decided to refer the case to the Tribunal.)

The Rôle of the Government

But let us not get this matter out of perspective. Arbitration without the readiness to strike is a broken reed, but there are also narrow enough limits to what strikes can do. Strikes cannot always be successful in the aim of getting a wage increase or fighting off a decrease: so much depends on the state of trade and the amount of unemployment. And behind the employers is always the government, with its steady purpose of keeping capitalism going—which means keeping it on a profit-making basis. Many workers fail to see this and expect the government to remain "neutral." After seven years of Conservative government memories have grown dim about what preceded those seven years, and many workers believe that while the present government one-sidedly opposes the workers and wants to keep wages down, things were different under the Labour Government.

Not Different Under Labour Government

Things were not different under Labour Government. The same causes produced the same effects. The obligation to keep capitalism going led the Labour Government to assert the doctrine of "wage restraint," and the Tories have carried it on. The next Labour Government will do the same.

But for those who have forgotten, it was all set down in the Labour Government’s "Statement on Personal Incomes, Costs and Prices" of February, 1948. Re-reading that document alongside recent declarations made by the Tories confirms Mr. MacMillan’s jibe in the House of Commons on May 8th, 1958, that the statements made by the Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer and by the late Sir Stafford Cripps, "were very similar. One might almost think they were written by the same hand."

The 1948 Statement asked individual employers not to pay wages above agreed rates; asserted that there could be no justification for a general increase of wages (or profits and interest) unless accompanied by a substantial increase in production; denied the claim of workers to have higher wages merely to keep relativity with other workers who had had an increase; declared that the Government would observe those principles in its negotiations with its own employees; urged all who were engaged in negotiations, or "decisions which might result in an increase in wages or other personal incomes" (i.e., the Arbitration Tribunals) not to depart from these principles; and stated firmly that if there was any departure, employers and the nationalised industries could not expect to call on the Government to provide the money or make it available through increased prices. (Just like the recent Government attitude to railwaymen and busmen.)

The 1948 White Paper had one clause saying that if at some future date there was a marked rise in the cost of living the level of wages, etc., would need reconsideration.

As the cost of living was rising more or less continuously the need arose soon enough, but not much more than a year later the Labour Government added another turn to the screw by announcing that there was no case for higher wages even if the cost of living did increase. This arose when the Government devalued the pound in 1949, knowing that this would raise the cost of living still further. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, the late Sir Stafford Cripps said in the House of Commons (September 27th, 1949):-

“ Especially and specifically there can, in our view, be no justification for any section of the workers, trying to recoup themselves for any rise in the cost of living due to the altered exchange rate.”

All this time, under Labour Government and Tory Government, strikes were continued and will continue.

Those who think that the workers’ struggles over wages would cease if we had a different sort of government are deluding themselves; as also are those who think that strikes are no longer a necessary weapon of defence for the worker.

Edgar Hardcastle