What the Labour Party wants. (1927)

From the September 1927 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the Labour Press Service (August 3rd) is a critical summary of the activities of the Government during the past parliamentary session. The Conservatives are condemned, and we are given the chief Labour proposals which, because they were “aimed at helping the working classes” were “overwhelmingly rejected by the Government and their Tory supporters.”

We need not waste much time over the record of the Conservative Government. They were elected by voters—mainly members of the working class—who want Capitalism and who prefer it to be administered by the Conservative Party. The Conservatives have, naturally, looked after the interests of their own section of the propertied class, and if this has not been approved by those who voted for them, the latter will presumably register their dissatisfaction at the next election.

Now for the Labour Party’s case against the Government:—

“What is the record of the session as it affects the workers ? Firstly, their wages have gone down by nearly a quarter of a million pounds a week. Secondly, scores of thousands of them, having been deprived of their unemployment benefit, have been driven either to the workhouse or to the Relieving Officer. Thirdly, the Government grants in aid of relief work have been cut down by one half, and thousands of willing would-be workers have consequently been turned on to the streets. Fourthly, relations with Russia have been broken off, and many orders for British factories have thereby been jeopardised. Fifthly, the balance of £12,000,000 which stood to the credit of the road fund has been grabbed by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and many millions of pounds’ worth of employment on road-making has had to be cancelled. Sixthly, several new taxes have been imposed upon the workers—notably on crockery, tobacco and matches—and all the food taxes have been re-imposed.”

This is a formidable-looking list, and to it have to be added the Trade Union Bill, and one or two other non-financial measures.

The Labour Party in the House opposed all of these, and claims credit for the fact that when they were in office wages went up instead of down. Had they remained in office another year they would have abolished entirely the “iniquitous” sugar tax, and reduced the tax on tea.

Now let us examine the value of the aims the Labour Party has set before itself, itself.

First, there is the increase of wages during the Labour Government’s term of office, contrasted with the decline this year. The Labour Government began in January, 1924, and ended in October, covering eight completed months from February to September. During those months the average of the Board of Trade cost of living indices was 73 per cent. (approx.) above the 1914 level, as compared with 72½ per cent. (approx.) for the same months of 1923. As a result of this slight rise in prices, wages tended to rise, the nett increase being about £500,000 per week.

The average cost of living index for the 6 months from February to July, 1926, was approximately 70 per cent. above the 1914 level; and for the 6 months ended July, 1927, approximately 67 per cent. In consequence of this fall in prices since 1926, wages have fallen by about £250,000 per week. We see, therefore, that this particular claim made by the Labour Party is an empty one. The purchasing power of the workers’ wages was not appreciably different under the two Governments; and in view of the fact that neither of them made any change in the economic organisation of the country, this is as we would expect. The change of Government had no more effect on wages than it had on the weather.

With regard to point number (2) regarding unemployment pay, it is interesting to recall that, under the Labour Government, owing to a tightening up of the administration, many thousands of unemployed workers were deprived of out-of-work pay.

As grants in aid of relief work for the year 1926 amounted to about £6,500,000 (Labour Year Book, p. 88) it would appear from point (3) that the Government has cut down that expenditure by about £3,250,000.

The Conservatives for political reasons broke off diplomatic relations with Russia; the Labour Party would resume them. From the Road Fund, £12,000,000 which might have provided a certain amount of employment on road repairs, has been allocated for other purposes. Sixthly, new taxes have been imposed on crockery, tobacco and matches amounting to a total of about £4,000,000 (Labour Bulletin, May, 1927).

The sugar tax amounts to less than £20 million and the tea tax less than £6 million. These the Labour Government would reduce or abolish. Adding together the various items mentioned, we find a grand total of £45 million which is the kernel of the dispute between Labour and Conservatives. It is assumed by the Labour Party that taxes are a burden on the workers and that they would gain from tax reduction. In fact, this is quite untrue. Even if we assume (which is not always or necessarily the case) that prices fall as taxes are reduced, the workers do not gain thereby, because wages fall correspondingly. In the Ministry of Labour Gazette (July) figures are published showing the movement of prices and wages from 1920 to 1927. Taking March in each year the following gives a rough comparison of the “average percentage increase in weekly full-time wages” and the “average percentage increase in cost of living”— both based on the 1914 level:—

As will be seen from this, during the first year wages and prices were both about 130 per cent. above the 1914 level. In 1921 and 1922 wages were ahead; in 1923, 1924 and 1925 prices were ahead; and in the last two years wages were slightly above the price level again. On the whole, wages followed prices fairly closely. The purchasing power of the workers remained almost constant. Remission of taxes, if it caused lower prices, would benefit not the workers but their employers, if prices remained the same, the manufacturers would benefit. If this were not so the employers and the manufacturers of the articles affected would not constantly be agitating for lowered taxes. Taxes are a burden on the propertied class. The struggle is an internal one, each group of capitalists trying to “pass it on” to another group. This is the non-working class issue on which the Labour Party concentrates its attention.

But let us put aside for the moment the question as to who pays the taxes. Let us suppose that this sum of £45 million is, as the Labour Party says, a burden on the workers. Still, the Labour Party deserve condemnation. They seek the support of the workers to fight out the question of this £45 million. It is the chief plank of the more permanent part of their programme. On it they fight tenaciously, but on the question which matters they are forever silent. The amount of unearned income, calculated for the purpose of the income tax is about £1,200 millions per year (The National Income, 1924, Bowley & Stamp, p. 47). The Labour Party will put up a strenuous fight for £45 millions, but have nothing to say about the £1,200 millions. They strain at the gnat and swallow the camel. The expenditure on unemployment pay and Poor Law Relief is less than £80 millions a year all told, yet in face of this £1,200 millions pocketed by non-wealth producers, the Labour Party can only charge the Conservatives with failure to spend a few millions on the unemployed.

The Socialist case is fundamentally different from that of the Labour Party, We point to the fact that out of the wealth annually produced by the workers a large proportion is retained and consumed by the employing class merely because they are property owners. Professor Clay states (“Manchester Guardian,” Feb. 19, 1925) that 94.5 per cent. of the population receive only 56 per cent. of the national income. This is due to the fact that the means of wealth production are privately owned. The same authority declares (“Daily News,” Aug. 2, 1927) that 76 per cent. of the population own only 7 per cent. of the capital of the country, while 6 per cent. own 81 per cent. of the capital. The workers are poor because of the existence of a wealthy class living by owning property. Our aim is to dispossess that class. The aim of the Labour Party is to dicker about a paltry £45 million. If every one of the points mentioned here were to be put into operation by a Labour Government, the workers would still be wage-earners, producing wealth for the propertied class. They would still be poor in the presence of the power to produce wealth in abundance. The choice for the workers is between Socialism and Capitalism. If they choose Capitalism, it matters little whether it is administered by Liberals, Conservatives or the Labour Party.

Edgar Hardcastle

Political Parties and the General Strike (1976)

From the May 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

A great deal can be learned from the experience of the working class in the General Strike. Not only does this expose the futile policies of left-wing groups, but it goes a long way towards explaining the generally submissive attitude of the trade unions during the current crisis.

Right from the beginning, the General Strike had little chance of success, due to the economic condition of capitalism at that time. The boom after the First World War turned out to be brief. By the summer of 1920 world markets were contracting with a heavy rise in unemployment: in June 1920 2 million were unemployed in Britain. The traditional industries such as coal were suffering in particular. The position became worse for the coal industry because of competition from the USA, Germany and Poland. A. J. P. Taylor in English History 1914-45 describes the economic conditions which led to the General Strike and to its ultimate failure:

Over-production of primary products dominated the inter-war years, and the impoverishment of these producers brought something near ruin to the old British industries. Exports of coal ran down to almost nothing. British prices tumbled faster than they had risen, and employment tumbled.

During the War the government had taken control of the mines, but the industry was handed back to control by the coal owners in March 1921. Economists opposed government subsidies to the coal industry since the current economic policy necessitated the fixing of the pound to the Gold Standard as a means of arresting its declining value vis-a-vis the American dollar.

In this situation the economists were arguing, as they still do, about the need to increase exports. To do this, prices had to be lowered to compete with rival coal-producing powers. At the same time, profitability must be maintained by lowering wages.

Resistance to reductions in wages had already been tried by the miners, in conjunction with the railwaymen and the transport workers, in the “Triple Alliance" of 1921. The collapse of this industrial action, which became known as “Black Friday”, portended the disaster of the General Strike. Baldwin’s 1925 policy of granting a subsidy to the coal industry, together with his establishment of the Samuel Commission, were measures by which the Government could play for time. By May 1926 the subsidy was due to run out and the mine-owners were continuing their demands for a reduction in wages and longer working hours. The secretary of the Miners’ Federation, Arthur Cook, more militant than his predecessor Frank Hodges, was determined that the miners should stand out against wage reductions. He was supported by the Federation’s President, Herbert Smith. The overwhelming majority of miners backed the strike.

United we stand

Nevertheless, by April 1926 the Government was prepared to make a stand against strike action as it had been in 1921. All the same, Stanley Baldwin and the Conservatives manifestly wished to avert a General Strike which they regarded as an intensification of the class struggle. Baldwin’s policies meant that he had to walk a tightrope between the TUC, and the mine-owners (together with the reactionary elements in the Conservative Party). Although the Conservative government introduced the temporary subsidy in 1925, Baldwin said: “‘All workers in this country have got to face a reduction of wages to help put industry on its feet.”

This was the predictable statement of an administrator of capitalism. It was part of Baldwin’s political strategy not to appear to be the ally of the mine-owners. Instead, he posed as the defender of what was termed as “the British Constitution” against what were considered to be the sectional interests, in the form of the TUC and the miners.

In the Conservative cabinet Lord Birkenhead also represented himself as a pseudo-conciliatory figure. Meanwhile, Churchill, Austen Chamberlain, Joyson-Hicks and Neville Chamberlain were all opposed intransigently to both the TUC and the miners. Steel-Maitland, the Minister of Labour, was himself a mine owner. Members of the Cabinet such as Churchill favoured parades of troops, tanks and armoured cars in the streets against the strikers. Churchill had vigorously opposed subsidies and belligerently claimed that the strikers were Communists under the influence of what he termed as "Red subversion".

The Liberal Party had shown that it was equally determined to protect the interests of Capitalism. Asquith and the Liberal Shadow Cabinet condemned the strike in a straightforward fashion while Lloyd George was trying to gain some political advantage from the affair by declaring that, although the strike was a mistake, the Conservative government was also culpable to some degree.

A similar position of opposition to the strike was adopted by the Labour Party. MacDonald, Snowden, Thomas, Clynes and Henderson in common with the Conservative, Baldwin, all believed in the sanctity of the "British Constitution”, so a rift developed between the TUC and the Parliamentary Labour Party. The "Left”, in the form of Maxton, Lansbury, Wheatley and Cook were under the familiar misconception that capitalism was on the verge of collapse and believed that the General Strike could be turned into some type of revolution.

At that time, the Russian Revolution was still fresh in many people’s memories. The "Communist” Party believed that a workers’ revolution was about to spread across the industrialized countries. However, its support amongst the working class was quite insignificant: its membership amounted to less than five thousand. Two years before the General Strike the CP was making statements such as members of the armed forces should be helping the workers to smash capitalism. The theory of Capitalism being on the verge of collapse was held by the CP and, though it was prepared to use parliamentary methods as a propaganda platform, it also advocated violence and insurrection. It had been barred from affiliation with the Labour Party and so concentrated its efforts on attempting to win support in the trade unions, believing that the formation of factory committees would lead to them being "indispensable weapons in the struggle to force the capitalists to relinquish their grip on industry”. Such an attitude towards the General Strike and towards the idea of revolution was not only adventurist but, what is more important, blatantly anti-democratic.

Tactics

When the General Strike broke out on May 3rd the striking miners were joined by the railwaymen and workers in transport, printing, heavy industry, building and the gas and electricity industries.

The government monopolized the means of propaganda. It was able to put forward its own case in the British Gazette, its own newspaper, the editor of which was the reactionary Churchill. He denounced the British workingmen as "the enemy” and in the columns of the newspaper he demanded that they surrender. The BBC, although theoretically independent and not yet a public corporation, was very much in the government’s pocket and suppressed news which might bring embarrassment upon the government. The TUC published the British Worker which was ineffective since it was forbidden to give out ordinary news or propaganda.

Many myths have been told about the General Strike. Various syndicalist groups and the CP have claimed that the General Strike produced a "revolutionary situation”. Such an interpretation of the events is completely mistaken. There was no opportunity for revolution and certainly no possibility for a Socialist revolution. The strike was one of sympathy and had no revolutionary undertones. The reverse was the case. The General Council of the TUC strove to bring a conclusion to the miners’ strike. It had no desire for a confrontation with the government or the mine-owners. However, the Miners’ Federation was determined to make a stand against the proposed wage reductions and longer hours. Arthur Cook and Herbert Smith were opposed to the Samuel Commission. The mine-owners were equally intransigent, while Baldwin’s cabinet was steering clear of negotiations until concessions had been made by the miners.

The TUC General Council’s decision to call the General Strike was, from the point of view of the “respectable” trade union leaders, a shrewd tactical manoeuvre. By calling a strike of these dimensions the General Council could apply greater pressure on the Government to participate in negotiations to resolve the miners’ dispute. When the attempts broke down, the TUC General Council called off the strike and therefore isolated the miners, who continued their strike in conditions of semi-starvation until November 1926.

The Wrong Road

The idea of revolution had no support amongst the members of the TUC General Council, who were eager to solve the dispute and reconcile the two sides of the coal industry. Large sections of the British working class were undoubtedly sympathetic towards the miners. However, they were not revolutionary and were certainly not class-conscious. The vast majority of the miners themselves were not revolutionary. In spite of all the absurd statements made by the Left and by the Right, the General Strike was not political but was purely economic. A. J. P. Taylor correctly sums up the non-revolutionary attitude of the workers: "They were loyal to their unions and to their leaders, as they had been loyal during the war to their country and to their generals”.

Another historian, David Thomson, in England in the Twentieth Century remarks about the events of 1926: "The Sorelian myth of the ‘General Strike’, of ‘direct action’ on a scale great enough to coerce governments and paralyse nations, was not one accepted by the mass of British opinion, nor even by the organized workers themselves”. “What died in 1926, though nobody noticed, was the myth of syndicalist revolution as the road to better times”.

The failure of the General Strike is underlined by the fact that when the miners were driven to return to work in November 1926, they were compelled to accept the coal-owners’ demands: wage reductions, longer working hours and district agreements. Under the subsequent Trades Disputes Act of 1927 sympathetic strikes such as the General Strike were made illegal and, of course the Government had the support of the armed forces to back this up as well as the tacit agreement or apathy of the majority of the population.

The attitude of the Socialist Party of Great Britain towards general strikes and towards strikes overall is that they can only be used as a means of limited economic struggle. As long as capitalism exists, the strike will be a useful weapon for the working class: most effectively when trade booms occur, industry is expanding and there is a greater demand for workers. Under conditions of depression such as prevailed in 1926 and exist today in 1976, the strike will lose most of its effectiveness. The results of the General Strike and of many of the strikes occurring now, prove this.

If the workers are to abolish the conditions which they experience and which make strikes both necessary and inevitable, they must turn their attention to political action for the democratic act of establishing Socialism.

V. Lutra

Contemporary Voices (1976)

From the May 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

The form and nature of the General Strike is discussed elsewhere in this journal: What we deal with here is the fact that the capitalist class in 1926, and no less today, were aware that there are many ways to skin a cat. The strike hit the production of newspapers, but not to such an extent that the propaganda of the capitalist class was made impossible. The copy to hand — the 4 page Continental edition of the Daily Mail for Monday, 10th May 1926 — leaves no doubt that it was directed almost entirely to the British market. The paper itself describes how “no feer [sic] than 30,000 copies” of the previous day’s edition had reached England in the morning by air and were distributed nationally, while a further 150,000 arrived by boat in the early afternoon. We give here some excerpts, all from different articles, to illustrate the force of the propaganda war waged on the strikers.

The headlines above the lead article set the tone:

BUSINESS AS USUAL IN SPITE OF THE STRIKE.

GREAT FIRMS THAT ARE CARRYING ON.

LISTS FROM ALL PARTS OF BRITAIN.

MORE WORKERS GO BACK.

TRANSPORT SERVICES INCREASED.

The greater part of the article is then taken up with a list of approximately 100 of these “great” firms from Glasgow to the Isle of Wight. The strike was pronounced illegal, but not merely by the Daily Mail reporters, the experts were brought in:

Lord Mersey, the eminent jurist has expressed his entire agreement with the great lawyers who have already condemned the general strike as illegal. Speaking of the speech made by Sir John Simon in the House of Commons on Thursday night, in which it was pointed out that every workman who had broken his contract and every trade union official who had advised and prompted that course was liable to damages, Lord Mersey said to a Daily Mail reporter yesterday. I agree completely. It is good law.

Having received judgement in advance from the “good”, the “great” and the “eminent”, how the capitalist class must have greeted the prospect of wringing the immense wealth of the strikers from them in the law courts. However, the government was devising more hideous means of revenge. The paper reported that the strike was costing “Britain” £lm. a day:

An increase in direct taxation to meet the bill is contemplated by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, but he has stated categorically that he will require to impose substantial increases in indirect taxation. In other words, the strikers, who have deliberately brought this disaster on the nation, will be made to pay for it in higher beer and other taxes.

All (and only) strikers drank beer of course. As for some of the others — item:

Employés [sic] of the Oxford and District Omnibus Company called together to consider strike action, refused to hear the speakers and sang “Land of Hope and Glory.”

But even the strikers had their moments of light relief — item:

Police v Strikers. At a football match at Plymouth between strikers and the local police on Saturday, the Chief Constable’s wife kicked-off.

No mention of the result however. The government had issued a "new pledge to all strikers” through the BBC which the paper publicized in a front page block in capitals:

Everyman who does his duty by the country and remains at work, or returns to work during the present crisis will be protected by the State from the loss of trade union benefits, superannuation allowances, or pensions. His Majesty’s government will take whatever steps are necessary in Parliament, or otherwise, for this purpose. [Signed] Stanley Baldwin.

The General Council of the TUC was nervously making its attitude known:

We also want to make it clear that we are not challenging, as is clearly inferred in one part of Mr. Baldwin’s spech, [sic] the rules, the laws or the customs of our Constitution. We are certain that so far as we are concerned the Premier will find us willing to listen to any statements he may make.

The advertisements add some colour. While it was with some regret that we noted under “London Amusements” column that “The Great Lover” at the Shaftesbury Theatre was “closed until further notice”; it was going to take more than a general strike to stop some:

Drages of Holborn offer Mr. and Mrs. Everyman living in London or 20 miles outside, the convenience of their private motor car service to convey those selecting furniture to and from the showrooms.

While elsewhere the Gleneagles Hotel was pointing out that every summer it attracted “the leading figures of the British social scene. Duke’s son and dramatist, statesman and sportsman, tee up on the famous golf courses and enjoy the finest holiday that Britain has to offer. Top-of-the-tree men [monkeys?] swarm at Gleneagles. They know the right thing. Wise in labour, wise in leisure. The best folk go to Gleneagles because it is the best place to go.” They point out that a night-sleeper would take you there. Driven no doubt by one of the volunteer engine-drivers whose photographs appear on the back page. The previous day (a Sunday) was described by the Mail in terms so partisan that only the capitalist hacks could fail to see any contradiction:

Sabbath Calm. The results of all this was that London passed a very peaceful Sunday. The town almost returned to that old fashioned calm which used to be the wonder of Continental visitors. Churches were better attended than usual and special prayers for the national welfare were offered . . . In the Bird’s Cage Walk a detachment of the Royal Tank Corps is sharing the Guards Barracks. There have [sic] a column of armoured cars with them and elsewhere in South London a number of heavy tanks are parked.

The Church, of course had something to say, and workers today should note carefully who had and (still have) “god on their side.”

Cardinal Bourne, the Archbishop of Westminster, during High Mass at Westminster Cathedral yesterday made the following declarations; there is no moral justification for a general strike of this character. It is a direct challenge to a lawfully constituted authority and inflicts without adequate reason immense discomfort and injury on millions of our fellow countrymen. It is therefore a sin against the obedience which we owe to God, Who is the source of that authority, and against the charity and brotherly love which are due to our brethren. All are bound to oppose it and assist the Government.

After three full pages of unadulterated opposition to the strike, the Mail writers ran out of steam, and had to rest. The back page is dominated by photographs under the heading “Pictorial phases of the General Strike”. What is notable here is that a reader would be unaware that there was any strike. We have volunteer railway-men, special constables on their way to work, members of the Chelsea Naval Depot eagerly reading the Daily Mail (what else?), and city working girls who have turned their offices into bedrooms to obviate transport problems to and from work. But a striker? Or a closed factory? Not one. When the newspaper could attack them no more, it simply ignored them. A deliberate policy aimed at confusing and dividing opinion against the strike. As far as public opinion was concerned, the paper published one letter only. It inevitably reflected a view with which the owners of the Daily Mail would agree. Although fifty years old now, it has a current ring to it:

The country is sick to death of these so-called trade union leaders. They are nothing else but revolutionaries notwithstanding their protests. Trade Unionism has got out of hand and requires to be clubbed on the head to put it back in its proper place.

As we watch Messrs. Murray, Jones and Scanlon of the present-day entering into “negotiations” with the government over how far the living standards of the working class can be permitted to fall, the correspondent would no doubt agree that they are now back in their “proper place.” The point is that the trade unions were not revolutionary in 1926 — in Britain or elsewhere. If this had been the case we should have no trade unions, with or without leaders, today. Nor should we be reading "yesterday’s news” in the knowledge that tomorrow morning we can read the same sentiments all over again.

Alan.

Editorial: The Socialist View of the Trade Union Bill. (1927)

Editorial from the May 1927 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Government, to please the “Die-hards” in the Conservative Party and the more unthinking of its supporters generally, has chosen this moment to produce a Bill containing very drastic amendments of the law as it affects the trade unions. The chief provision may be summarised as follows :—

Certain sympathetic strikes and strikes for non-trade union purposes are to be declared illegal. Picketing is to be restricted. Civil Servants and unions are to be cut off from contact with outside trade unions and political parties, and local authorities are to be forbidden to give preference to trade unionists in their employ. Lastly, the member of a union who wishes to contribute to the political fund must individually express his desire to do so, instead of, as now, the onus being on the non-contributor to express his unwillingness.

Whatever the future may bring forth, the immediate effect has been to stir the officials of the trade unions to a frenzy of denunciation. It is said by many, and believed, that this is a deliberate and calculated endeavour to smash trade unionism ; and to cripple the finances of the Labour Party. Believing this, the labour leaders who feel their jobs in danger will doubtless fight with more genuine enthusiasm than they displayed last year, for instance, in the attempted General Strike.

If, however, we consider the matter calmly, it is obvious that the Government’s action is not capable of so simple an explanation. Hotheads there may be in the Conservative ranks, but the big industrial and financial capitalists whose interests the Government represents, would never want trade unionism smashed, however much they may desire the removal of certain—for them —unpleasant features. The trade unions have become an integral part of the industrial and administrative machinery of Capitalism, and the fear that the proposed legislation may be pushed too far by the Tory “Diehards” has quickly induced many Conservative newspapers as well as the bulk of the Liberal press to issue a call for a less provocative attitude on the part of the Government. Both the “Daily News” (April 19th) and the Conservative “Observer” (April 17th) have particularly stressed the opposition which is being displayed to the Bill by influential employers. They can see something which should be obvious. The employing class and their Government are quite strong enough to deal with any strike, sectional or general, without altering the law. Legal changes will not increase the power of the ruling class, and will needlessly exasperate the workers. The number of strikes will not be diminished, and they may well be accompanied by an increased bitterness which may endanger Capitalist property. Votes will be lost to Conservative candidates, and the only important gains will be to the lawyers, who will net big fees by assisting the Courts to understand what the Bill means. The Bill will certainly hamper the trade unions in various ways, and will please some very vociferous Conservative supportersv but as the employers generally will probably, on balance, reap no advantage, it seems fairly certain that the Government has no intention of pushing it through as it stands, or alternatively, they do not intend to enforce it too rigidly when it has been passed. It is possible, as has been suggested, that the Bill’s purpose is to distract attention from the Government’s activities in China.

Of one thing we can be certain. If the workers ever feel moved again to come out on strike as in May last year, a mere declaration of the illegality of their action will not prevent them.

On the question of the Political Levy, our position has often been stated. As we oppose the Labour Party, and do not believe that it will or can solve the major problems of the working-class, we do not want to contribute to Political Funds to finance the Labour Party through the trade unions, and we are not perturbed at this proposed alteration in the law. Members of the Socialist Party habitually decline to contribute and will continue to do so. Furthermore, we are convinced that it would be better for the trade unions if they confined themselves to definitely trade union objects. They must necessarily accept to membership Liberals, Conservatives, Labour Party supporters and Socialists, as well as people with no political allegiance. They would increase their fighting strength if they dropped their support of one Party, and thus removed a cause of apathy and disloyalty among all those who have other or no political views. The trade unions would then become more effective in struggling against the effects of Capitalism. When the workers become Socialist, they will organise politically to establish Socialism. Neither for that purpose nor in the present task of resisting the encroachments of the employers is anything gained by supporting the Labour Party.

The fact that this Bill should have provoked a more bitter political fight than we have seen for years, is itself an adequate condemnation of the Labour Party’s policy. Had that party ever made Socialism the issue, it would have found itself engaged in an unceasing death-struggle with the parties defending Capitalism. Because its aim is not Socialism, but merely the reform of Capitalism, its fights have all been sham fights; it has been an honoured member of coalition governments (as during the War), and was placed in office in 1924 by Liberal votes to do specific pieces of Capitalist work. What a commentary on a political party that the first serious battle of its existence occurs because of an attack on the funds which pay the salaries and election expenses of its politicians !

Taxation and the workers. The budget and the bottom dog. (1925)

From the June 1925 issue of the Socialist Standard

The introduction of the Budget has once more provided the Labour Party with an opportunity of demonstrating their utility to the master-class and their utter uselessness to the workers ; and right nobly have they risen to the occasion. While hundreds of delicate, half-starved women are being told by unemployment committees that they are not genuinely seeking work these redoubtable champions of the under-dog can find nothing better to do than to kick up a shindy over a tax on silk stockings !

Not only do they find themselves in the company of Liberals such as Runciman and Co. and Tories such as Colonel Gadie, of Bradford and other representatives of the employers of the West Riding, but that notorious organ of democratic enlightenment, the “Daily Mail” also rallies to their support and condemns the fiscal folly of the chameleon Chancellor. How inspiring ! What enthusiasm the spectacle must awaken in the breasts of those who seek to persuade us that the Labour Party is entitled to the support of Socialists !

Now, frankly, fellow-worker, what do these taxes matter to you? Have you ever known them make any practical difference to your condition in the long run? When, for instance, the man who won the war (you know who I mean, of course) bilked the tyrannous landlords of a halfpenny in the pound on the unimproved value of their estates, to provide money for battleships, did you buy a car or take a tour to the Riviera? Of course not ! You went along to your job just as you always had done or you lined up at the Labour Exchange along with hundreds of thousands of others in a similar plight; and such has been your lot whatever taxes have been put on or taken off. Nor is the reason far to seek.

Why are taxes imposed at all? That is the question you must first answer if you are to arrive at any understanding of the matter. As hinted above they are imposed for the purpose of providing for the expenditure of the State. The Labour Party themselves have on occasion shown that the greater proportion of that expenditure is upon the armed forces. Do those forces exist for your benefit? Is it for your sake that the Navy guards the products of the farms and ranches overseas, of the tribute of the gold-fields and of the cotton, cocoanut and other tropical plantations? Is it on your behalf that aircraft terrorise the inhabitants of India and Iraq, where the oilfields are? You only need to remember what happens when a large strike is on to find your answer. Then another branch of the services is told off to see that you do not lay unholy hands on the products of the labour of your class. You are forcibly reminded that in the land of your birth you are the bottom-dog whenever you seek to challenge the "justice” of your subsistence wages.

Of course there are not lacking fatuous boobs who profess to believe that taxation can be and is used for what they are pleased to call “social amelioration” as a primary object. The facts are all against them. Take any form of non-militant expenditure such as that on education, sanitation, the relief of destitution and the like and you will invariably find that such expenditure is manifestly totally inadequate to raise the workers above the level of mere profit-producing machines.

The “education” provided is such as will fit the child for absorption in due course into the factory, shop, or office of the boss. It is primarily an education in discipline necessary to capitalism. The instinctive curiosity of the child is smothered under a heap of “facts” systematically loaded with the cant and prejudice of religion and patriotism. That is all that education means to the workers beyond the rudimentary three r’s.

The sanitation provided in working class areas is the minimum necessary to prevent the spread of infectious diseases to the areas occupied by their exploiters. It is notoriously inadequate to prevent the workers sinking to the C3 level ! After a century of sanitary legislation the slum still survives, a standing menace to healthy social development.

As for the relief of destitution by such methods as insurance, these have been shown in these columns repeatedly as being nothing more than attempts to economise by centralisation—the alternative to extra police protection. Once again the sums given are nothing more than will actually prevent the masses of the destitute from raiding the food stores.

The entire machinery of government thus exists simply for the purpose of preserving the system by which the workers are robbed of the greater portion of the fruits of their labour. It is, therefore, a matter of indifference to the workers how taxes are raised. The essential point to bear in mind is that the sums raised are utilised in opposition to the interests of the workers.

Reformers and taxation-tinkerers of all kinds endeavour to establish some connection between taxes and the workers’ condition in order to claim their electoral support. Protectionists try to maintain that certain forms of taxation will increase employment. Free Traders pretend to oppose them on the ground that such taxes will increase the workers’ cost of living. Neither side have ever proved their case; but even if they had the fact would contain no consolation for the worker.

Whether the workers are busy or idle they are poor and the boom is inevitably followed by the slump. So much for the Protectionist. America is eloquent testimony to the fallacy of his arguments. The Free Traders, whether they call themselves Liberals or Labour men have nothing better to offer. Even were it true that taxes on commodities materially affected their prices for any length of time (which is a mere assumption) how does that affect the workers? Wages are based upon the cost of living of the working-class as shown in last month’s issue of this paper. If there is any truth in the dogma that “the consumer pays” then a rise in the cost of living is “passed on” to the consumer of labour-power, i.e., the capitalist employer ! In actual practice, however, quite irrespective of the incidence of taxation, the workers are engaged in a continual struggle to prevent wages sinking beneath the level of subsistence.

Protectionists and Free Traders alike simply represent the interests of different sections of the exploiting class. The Cobdens and the Brights no less than the Chamberlains were concerned with screwing the maximum amount of profit out of their slaves and simply used the cry of “Taxes” as a means to dupe them on the political field. The triumph of Free Trade was the signal for an all-round reduction in wages.

The Labour Party claims to have inherited the mantle of these Liberal hypocrites. So far as the Socialist is concerned they are very welcome to it. Socialism remains the only means by which the workers can achieve their emancipation from poverty and subjection. The Socialist therefore does not advocate this or that method of financing the State, but only the capture of the machinery of government by the consciously organised working class for the purpose of establishing Socialism and ridding us of the instrument of oppression for ever.

Eric Boden

The Parties and the Election. (1929)

From the May 1929 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Party of "Deeds"—The Conservatives.

The Conservatives are fighting the election on their past record. They survey the existing condition of this country and ask you, the electors, to agree that it is good. In the words used by Mr. Baldwin in his speech at Drury Lane Theatre on April 18th—

  You may judge us by what we have done.
(Reported in “Daily Telegraph,” 19 April, 1929.)

It has been agreed by the Conservatives, the Liberals and the Labour Party that the main question on which the election is to be fought is unemployment and the possibility of finding a cure for it. Mr. Baldwin in a speech at Bristol on April 25th (See “Times" Report, 26th April) was content to point out that even if some 10 per cent. of the workers are unemployed there is great comfort to be derived from the knowledge that the other 90 per cent, are working and “are enjoying a higher standard of life than has ever been enjoyed before." He also expressed a modest hope that given freedom from social “hurricanes and cataclysms" unemployment will be “reduced to normal by a natural process in three or four years."

This kind of pledge is as safe as any of the ambiguities produced by Old Moore. What, to begin with, is normal? When an unemployed army of about 1¼  millions exists over a period of some eight years or more it is “normal." And what is to prevent the Conservative Government, whenever it may wish to do so, from producing the requisite “social hurricanes," as in 1926, by engineering large industrial disputes? And even without that rather drastic method, they can fall back on the simple device of “abolishing unemployment" by disentitling claimants for unemployment pay and passing them on to the Poor Law, or giving the older workers a meagre pension to secure their withdrawal from the labour market.

The Labour Party and the Liberals—The Parties of "Promises."

The Liberals, knowing full well that they are not in the least likely to receive a majority of seats in the new House of Commons, the fighting on Mr. Lloyd George’s schemes for providing work for the unemployed. Whereas Mr. Baldwin believes that “by a natural process" the volume of unemployment will be reduced to normal in three or four years, Mr. Lloyd George promises to secure the same result in a year.

The Labour Party have pointed out that, neither in principle nor in details, is there anything new in Mr. Lloyd George's schemes. The Labour Party, with a much better prospect of securing a majority than the Liberals, are equally confident that their development schemes, coupled with Nationalisation of various industries and transport services, will secure even more than a mere reduction to normal. They will not be content with anything far short of total abolition.

What is the “ Natural Process”?

What all three Parties and their advisers on economic questions persistently ignore is that the “natural process" referred to by Mr. Baldwin operates not in the direction of removing unemployment, but in the reverse direction. The “natural process" of capitalism is in the direction of greater and greater productivity; more wealth produced by fewer workers; machines replacing men. This is the natural process everywhere at work, and constantly aggravating the problem. Given capitalism, that is the private ownership of the means for producing and distributing wealth, and the continued tendency for that ownership to be concentrated more and more in the hands of the wealthy few, unemployment is not to be solved by any of the familiar devices of increased production, greater efficiency, more exports, or the purchase of home produced goods. The position in the coal mines of this country illustrates the factors at work in every land and throughout industry. Between March, 1928, and March, 1929, coal exports increased, and coal production increased by nearly 500,000 tons a week (nearly 10 per cent.), but the number of miners employed decreased by 20,000 (2 per cent.) (See Board of Trade Journal 28th March).

The wealth of the capitalist world is in the hands of a few. They own the factories, and they alone decide whether and when those factories shall be used for the production of goods. The luxurious living and sheer waste of the capitalists and their Governments are far outstripped by the ever-growing powers of production. Whatever name Liberals or the Labour Party may give to their schemes, they can only keep off the labour market the ever-growing army of men thrown out of employment through rationalisation, new machinery, etc., by various forms of wasteful expenditure, private and State charity, whether these take the form of relief works, a huge standing Army and Navy, expenditure on wars and battleships, hordes of officials, or unnecessary domestic servants. That is not a solution of the unemployment problem. Unemployment can be removed only by the abolition of capitalism.

Unemployment not the cause of poverty.

There is, however, a more important question. These Parties are all content to fight the election on the issue of unemployment. The Socialist Party alone is not. Poverty is not caused merely by unemployment. The working class in general are poor, in work or out, and in every part of the world where capitalism prevails. When Mr. Baldwin says that the workers enjoy "a higher standard of life than has ever been enjoyed before,” he blandly ignores the fact that the workers' standard of life is far below the ordinary standard of the privileged class of non-producers—the capitalist class. They own and control the land, the railways, the factories, mines, ships, and other means of producing and distributing wealth. Out of the whole vast wealth of this country it is estimated by Professor Henry Clay (Liberal) that "it is probably safe to say that over two-thirds of the National capital is held by less than 2 per cent. of the people.” (“Times," 24th March, 1925).

The working class are the majority of the population. They produce the wealth and organise industry from top to bottom. They provide the sinews, the muscles and the brains of industry.

The capitalists are the small minority, but they own and control industry. Of the goods produced each year by the working class, Professor Clay states that 94.5 per cent, of the population have only 56 per cent. of the whole annual income. That is to say that nearly half the National income is enjoyed by 5.5 per cent of the population. (See "Times,’’ March 24th, 1925.)

That is why the workers are poor.

What is Socialism?

We stand for Socialism, which means the transfer of the means of production from the hands of the few to society as a whole, involving the ending of the whole system based on a class of owners who enjoy but do not produce, and a class of producers who do not own. 

The method of doing this is for the working class majority to understand Socialism, organise in the Socialist Party and vote their delegates into control of the House of Commons. Nothing short of Socialism will abolish working class poverty and unemployment. But Socialism will at the same time solve all the economic problems which are the subject matter of the long and intricate programmes about which these three big parties are disputing.

They fight this and every election on plans to remedy some of the effects of capitalism. The Socialist Party fights for the abolition of capitalism.

Mr. Baldwin's Utopia: Can Lions and Lambs Co-operate? (1925)

From the April 1925 issue of the Socialist Standard

So many people have jumped on poor Mr. Baldwin for his recent appeal for an industrial truce, that it seems a shame to add to their number. He is such an “honest” man; so obviously well-meaning'; so kindly. His democratic tastes are illustrated by his addiction to the plebian pipe. In many of his speeches, how beautifully has he voiced his love of the English countryside; its farms, its hedgerows, its winding lanes and quiet villages. He loves the memory of the old days, when man and master were personal friends and the “sack” almost unknown. A man of simple tastes, with nothing of the “high brow" or superior person about him. If we were writing his life for a Sunday dope-sheet, we should describe him as “a plain, simple, home-loving Englishman; a lover of peace and tranquillity.” As we are writing for a Socialist paper, we have to take a wider view. We have to recognise that he is a big capitalist in a big essential industry. We must note that he is the elected head of a malignantly capitalist party. We must observe that he is speaking for the class that pays him and of which he is a representative member. This is not set down in any personal, malicious spirit, but as a plain statement of self-evident fact.

The speech itself was in no way remarkable. That it has occasioned such widespread controversy is an eloquent comment on the poverty of contemporary politics. One searches it in vain for a definite, tangible, constructive proposal upon which one can fasten and say, “Here is a gleam of hope for the workers.”' It was thickly besprinkled with woolly phrases such as: “Suspicion must be removed"; “all must join hands to pull the country into a happier position”; “all concerned in industry should try and get to the root of this kind of thing” ; “all should take counsel together and see where and how improvement can be made in this country, to achieve the desired result ”; “a common desire to get at the facts and a common desire to help things”—and so on. Just strings of windy bubbles, floating on a morass of verbiage. One bubble was not so gaseous as its fellows, but Mr. Baldwin did not know it. It was the text of his discourse: “I want to plead for a truce.” This, beyond a doubt, is a direct admission of the existence of a state of industrial war. Socialists have been engaged in pointing this out for upwards of a century. We call it the class struggle. In spite of Mr. Baldwin’s candid admission, you will find its existence regularly denied at least once a week. For what is a truce? An agreed temporary peace between belligerents. And who are the belligerents? Mr. Baldwin defined them in his opening sentences. We should have said “Capital and Labour,” or the “Workers versus the Parasites,” the “Rich versus the Poor,” or something equally trite and explicit. Mr. Baldwin phrased it differently. He said, “This country would be confronted more and more with great combines and great aggregations of labour.” And now, he said, when there seemed a faint hope of revival, we were confronted with a gathering storm which, if it burst, would blot out all prosperity. “All prosperity"! So there is some prosperity about somewhere. Are we very far wrong in assuming that the struggle the truce is to suspend is concerned with this prosperity and its position on the wrong side of the line? We know it is not on the workers' side. My. Baldwin, therefore, must be speaking for the other, the masters'. Behind the homely, pathetic figure of Mr. Baldwin we discern, without the aid of binoculars, the sinister figures of his employers. Ruthless, callous, malignant, and vindictive, the phalanx of capitalism is packed at his back. And having battered the workers to the edge of endurance, their spokesman suggests a truce. One feels tempted to reply:

   Mr. Baldwin and Friends,—We are deeply touched by your moving appeal for a truce in our embittered relations. Naturally a peace-loving, easy-going crowd, we are not entirely unsympathetic. But there are certain facts which seem to have escaped your notice. We would remind you that in ten short years you have succeeded in burying a million of us beneath Flanders' mud, and in maiming a further million or two preparatory to returning us to civil life. That civil life contains elements we do not consider altogether satisfactory. A million and a quarter of us seem condemned to perpetual unemployment. You endeavour to keep us from becoming troublesome by a niggardly, inadequate sum to which you attach the insulting term “the dole." Those of us fortunate enough to find masters have had our wages battered down to a point inconsistent with a full and joyous existence. Your promise of a land fit for heroes was a mockery; of better education for our children, a bitter jest. You cannot even house us. Your pleas of poverty and lack of funds are falsified by the millions found for rebuilding banks, stores, and offices on the most valuable sites in London; by the millions found annually for battleships and armies; by the constant oversubscription of gilt-edged loans. And we are sick of it. We are tired at playing Lazarus at the feast we have provided. We are—   

But we said one feels TEMPTED to reply in those terms. One quickly realises that he and his masters would be as deeply impressed by our oratorical flourishes as we are by theirs. We remember that “the rich will do anything for the poor, except get off their backs.” That is our sole concern—to get the rich off our backs. Speeches have their uses, but they will not do that. It is action that counts, and when' the workers decide to act intelligently and with knowledge they will not be fobbed off with speeches. Prosperity for the rich and poverty for the poor are inseparable. The one is the consequence of the other. To talk of a truce in such circumstances is to imply that we enjoy being robbed. There can be no truce between those who live by robbery, and their victims. The only concession one can make is to recognise that the division of society into two warring classes does not proceed from human wickedness or simple perversity. But it has proceeded from traceable historic causes, and having discovered its laws of growth, we can now guide the progress of society into a more harmonious form, wherein classes shall cease to exist, and class-war have no place. This is the mission of the working class, and by joining the Socialist Party each can take a part in inaugurating the new human society.

W. T. Hopley

The General Strike of 1926 (1966)

From the May 1966 issue of the Socialist Standard

London's Piccadilly was jammed with traffic. So was the Thames Embankment. Vehicles of all shapes and sizes—cars, vans, bicycles, horses and carts, almost anything on wheels— had been pressed into service.

This traffic chaos was news, but there were no newspapers. Out of Fleet Street came only a few bundles of single-sided cyclostyled sheets with a very brief digest of news snippets.

The railway stations were quiet except for the murmur of voices of bewildered people who had turned up with the hope of getting a train.

The docks were still and silent. Only at the gates, where groups of dock workers stood around, was there any sign of life.

The same pattern prevailed in towns and cities all over the country.

It was Tuesday, May 4, 1926--the first day of the General Strike. Workers whose Trade Unions had called on them to stop work, did so unanimously. The solidarity of the strike surprised even Trade Union officials and confounded thousands who had not expected the strike to take place.

During previous months, talks and negotiations, committees and commissions, reports and announcements telling how Trade Union leaders, the Government, the clergy and some prominent individuals were striving to find a solution to the deadlock, had led lots of people to believe that the strike would be cancelled at the last moment or that, if it was called, it would be a feeble affair, causing them little inconvenience. So, many awoke on that May morning without a thought that the day would be different to the one before.

For nine days the strike continued, more Unions joining in when called upon. At midday on the ninth day the General Council of the Trades Union Congress went to the Prime Minister and announced, “ . . the General Strike is being terminated today.” The news was broadcast at 1 p.m.

This abrupt ending caused more consternation inside Trade Union ranks than the calling of the strike had caused outside. Thousands of active, local Trade Unionists were struck speechless by the news. When they recovered their wits they set up a howl of protest and recrimination. They were the men who, during those nine days, had organised the pickets and demonstrations, arranged entertainment and recreation for the strikers, produced local strike bulletins, issued transport permits, planned help for the halt, the maimed and the blind and done the multitude of organisational jobs that had kept the strike solid. They had been the N.C.O.s of the battle. With confused ideas about the strike—theirs not, they thought, to reason why—they had done their job with enthusiasm. When, at the height of their zeal, they heard the retreat sounded, they were flabbergasted and enraged.

Angry voices accused the T.U.C. General Council of cowardice and treason. The General Council accused the miners of making impossible demands. Denunciation, recrimination, spite and mud-slinging were rife for weeks but, by the time of the next Trades Union Congress, the venom had subsided and members of the General Council were re-elected to office.

During the forty years since the General Strike the question has been frequently asked, “If the strike had not been called off so precipitately, could it have been brought to a successful conclusion?” The questioners have different ideas about what would have been a successful conclusion.

Their question implies that the Trade Unions planned the strike with a particular object in view, that the workers were led into the fight towards some preconceived goal. This is a complete misunderstanding of the event.

The threat to strike was an act of defence and defiance which the T.U.C. General Council did not expect to have to put into effect. They candidly admitted that they did not want the strike, that they did everything to avoid it including, as one of them said, grovelling to the Prime Minister. The Government forced them into the fight.

Ten months earlier the coal miners had given notice of their intention to terminate the miners' national agreement, to reduce their pay and increase their working hours. Failing acceptance of these demands, the miners were faced with a lock-out. They sought support from the T.U.C. and a committee of Unions representing miners, dockers, railwaymen and road transport workers planned to completely stop the handling of all coal if the lock-out notices were not withdrawn. At the final hour the notices were withdrawn, the Government granted the mine owners a nine months subsidy and set up a commission to investigate the coal industry.

The Trade Unions were delighted and the day of victory passed into the annals of working class history as “Red Friday”.

To those who did not blind themselves to what was happening around them, it was apparent that the employers and the Government had bought time to prepare for a show-down. The Trade Union leaders did the three monkey act; they saw nowt, heard nowt and did nowt.

The Government, without any effort at secrecy, instituted a strike breaking organisation, The Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies, mainly under the control of military and naval personnel. At the same time they held out hope to the miners by appointing a commission of enquiry into the coal industry.

Months later, when the commission reported, it offered the miners nothing and, with the end of the Government subsidy drawing near, the mine owners again submitted their demands.

With the Prime Minister acting the part of a benevolent mediator it was simple to misunderstand, if not ignore, the Government’s bellicose activities. After Red Friday it appeared logical to again threaten strike action as a counter to the mine owner’s threats. But with the passing days it became clear that the Government and employers were digging in their heels.

As zero hour approached, a conference of Trade Union delegates met in London and the T.U.C. General Council, acting as negotiating committee, met the mine owners and the Prime Minister daily. The Council found itself shuttled between an immovable Government and an irresistible delegate conference. When finally they reported their inability to move their opponents, the assembled delegates voted by 3,653,527 to 49,911 to empower the General Council to go ahead with the strike.

Despite the overwhelming vote, the General Council utilised the twenty six hours between the decision to strike and the appointed time for it to commence, to again try to get the miners’ lock-out notices withdrawn so that negotiations could continue without strike action. Eventually, a full cabinet meeting flatly refused even this modest request and the Prime Minister told the General Council that the proceedings must close because the strike had been called and because of overt acts, affecting the freedom of the press, that had already taken place. Printing Trade workers on the Daily Mail had refused to print an anti-working class article, and had walked out.

The Government utilised these last few hours to set its strike breaking machinery into operation. The King signed a proclamation declaring a state of emergency under the Emergency Powers Act of 1920. Orders in Council were issued, army leave was cancelled and troops moved to industrial areas. The commissioners of the Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies were instructed to put their machinery in motion. The mine owners made a final offer to the miners to settle with reduced wages and increased hours. At midnight on Monday the strike was on.

Throughout the strike the Union leaders emphasised that it was entirely an industrial dispute. The Government insisted that it was a challenge to the state and the democratic constitution and would lead to civil war. Communists urged that the strike could be used to displace the Conservative Government in favour of a Labour one. A few scatter-brained individuals even saw the strike as an attack on capitalism by class conscious workers, with the prospect of a social revolution.

All the circumstances considered, it was obvious the workers could not win. The number involved in the strike action was about three million. (G. D. H. Cole put the figure at 2,751,000).) That was quite a small portion of the total working class. The remainder were sympathetically indifferent, apathetic or hostile. The Government, despite a mild pretence at being an unbiased referee, was doing its job of keeping law and order. That meant preserving capitalist law and preventing the workers from being disorderly. Strikes create disorder. From its position of strength the Government could not lose.

Had the Government been weaker, and resigned under the strike threat, its successor, whether Liberal or Labour, would have had to do the same job of running capitalism. Subsequent Labour Governments proved that. Under similar circumstances they did similar things in the attempt to make capitalism run smoothly. The present outcry against unofficial strikes is a continuation of the policy. The workers must be kept at work without interruption for the hours and wages that the current trade condition requires.

That the General Strike could have led to a social revolution is a fantastic notion. The three million strikers reacted to what they considered an injustice, not because they were conscious of their class status and certainly not because they understood capitalism and the need to overthrow it.

When the strike was over the workers showed how un-class-conscious they were. Trade Union policy during the following years was one of greater class collaboration than ever before and Trade Union leaders cemented themselves more securely in their jobs.

The strike should have revealed the true nature of capitalist government, the real function of the state and the futility of leadership. But very few learned.

The workers will continue to struggle within capitalism and, whatever political party is in power, the government will use the state machinery against them, to keep them from disrupting the system or damaging the prospect of profits.

The General Strike was one battle in a continuous war. It was not a Waterloo. It was more like a Dunkirk. Battles on the industrial field, whether won or lost, will leave the workers still a subject class. With the employers entrenched behind their state, it requires political organisation with a knowledge of Socialism to dislodge them.

W. Waters.