Correction (1979)

From the March 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

In our notebook piece, Gormley, The Scab, last month, there was a slip. The poor devil who wants to form a genuine trade union is not a Polish miner but a Russian one and the “union” leader whom Gormley met is also Russian. (The mistake occurred because the two scabs met at a jamboree in Poland.) It is worth adding that the Russian miner (who is now incarcerated in a ‘‘hospital" where Gormley’s friends pump him full of mind-bending drugs) is not even guilty of the crime of being a Jew. He is no more a Jew than the appalling Gormley himself. And what do communist members of the Anti Nazi League against racism say about the Russian government “accusing" a man of being a Jew?

"Huffing and Puffing" (1973)

From the April 1973 issue of the Socialist Standard

Futile Talk by a Trade Union leader

The president of the Mineworkers’ Union, Joe Gormley, is making stroppy noises about the Government. He says: “The time for huffing and puffing is over” . . . "The Unions must put their feet where their mouth is” . . . “If you can’t abide the Government’s policies, then you must change the Government” — and that, he says, “Must mean the Trade Union Congress calling a General Strike”.

All this in the News of the World (18 February), which is appalled and calls on responsible trade-union leaders to “drag Mr. Gormley back from the brink”. He doesn’t think the Tories will win the next election, although he carefully avoids mentioning which party might win in the event of a Tory defeat.

The election (to be forced by a General Strike) will be about “rising prices”, “land speculation” and “property racketeers”. Obviously, Mr. Gormley had an election programme along these lines in mind. One wonders why the vociferous Gormley, who prides himself on his outspokenness and says it sometimes makes him unpopular, is so coy about this.

It is patently obvious that the only possible outcome of a Tory election defeat is a Labour Party victory and a Labour government. If Gormley is under the mistaken impression that this will in any way improve the lot of the workers, or increase the freedom of the trade unions, we must remind him that it was the postwar Labour government which prosecuted gas workers (who are on strike today under Tory rule without being prosecuted). The gasworkers were sentenced to a month’s imprisonment, later changed to a fine of £50 each.

Another of the ineffable Joe’s pipe-dreams is the notion that a Tory election defeat (and therefore Labour victory) can satisfactorily deal with rising prices, land speculation, and property racketeers. It was a Labour government which in addition to printing too many bank-notes, like the Tories, deliberately devalued the pound, or inflated the currency, increasing prices.

That a responsible official of a very large Union can so try to deflect attention from the Union’s real business (getting an increase in wages) shows how much they still have to learn of the economics of capitalism. Wages are also a price, and every trade-unionist wants this price to rise. The stupid folly of the TUC in allowing the Government to kid them that higher prices are the result of wage increases is doing much harm to the trade union movement.

As an organized political party seeking political power through the ballot, the Socialist Party of Great Britain have this to say to Gormley. Your talk about General Strikes to bring down governments is a counsel of folly and despair. If the organized trade-unionists made up a majority of the electorate (which they do not) then they could do this constitutionally anyway, but if they did it as an organized group they would be acting as a political party, not a trade union. But trade unions are not organized on political principles, but on trade or job qualifications.

Having defeated the Tories and returned a Labour (or TUC) government, they would then be faced with the job of all governments — running the country; and we have forty years of experience and six previous Labour governments to tell us exactly what they would do. Even if Joe Gormley himself were appointed Prime Minister, he would do what every PM does: protect capitalism, because he would not have been elected and have had no mandate to do anything else. He would have been elected to patch up capitalism (rising prices, etc., etc.).

As Mr. Wilson told the TUC once: "The job of a Government is to govern.” How much more money and time is the Mineworkers’ Union going to pour into the futile and useless Labour Party? For more than forty years they backed nationalization of the coal mines. This was eventually implemented, and notices were stuck up outside coal-pits saying: “These mines now belong to the People.” And organizations like “Age-Concern” now say that more elderly people are dying of cold than ever, because they cannot obtain enough of “their own” coal. Miners are still striking for increases in wages, as they did when the pits were privately owned.

Finally, about the General Strike. A General Strike, like all strikes, is a merely negative action. It is workers refusing to work, sitting down, or going home. It may remove or bring down a government. If the general-strikers (as in Italy now) are not Socialists, they will re-elect a non-Socialist — that is, a capitalist — government and the whole daft business starts all over again. For this reason, we have always consistently opposed the idea that capitalism can be damaged by political strikes. No mere strike action can help the establishment of Socialism, which is a positive measure where everybody does something to help. Of course, trade unions will have a hand in this.

The General Council of the TUC has given the answer to Gormley: “A total and continuous stoppage was ruled out because it would not be possible.” (Guardian, 28 Feb. 1973). Perhaps Joe Gormley will now stop “huffing and puffing” about political general strikes.

Horatio.

Political Notebook: Gormley the Scab (1979)

The Political Notebook column from the February 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

Gormley the Scab

It must be a hard life being a trade union leader. The endless meetings with the Government and the bosses in which they sell out their members’ interests, all those speeches to conference telling the workers to pull their belts in for the sake of the Right For Callaghan To Work campaign. And then there’s the insufferable inconvenience of delegations abroad, especially unmanageable when you consider the five-star hotels, the massive banquets and the tours around the workplaces to observe the sterile lives of those who put their trust in leaders. It is a well known fact that such visits are especially favoured when they are to East European state capitalist countries. Joe Gormley, leader of the National Union of Miners, returned not long ago from an outing to Poland where he met up with his counterpart, the leader of the State-controlled Polish miners’ union. Between cocktail parties the two workers’ representatives discussed the case of a certain Polish miner who was the foreman in a mine and was disturbed by the appalling conditions under which his men were forced to work which were in breach of the union regulations. Needless to say, his union failed to support his complaint so he attempted to set up an unofficial union to fight for better conditions of work in the mines. But real unions aren’t allowed in the People’s Democracy of Poland and the man was thrown into a psychiatric hospital. Recalling the heroic struggles of British workers to form unions like the NUM, one might have expected Gormley to have had a few tough words to say to his Polish counterpart. But. according to a report in the Observer, Gormley accepted that this man’s incarceration was quite legitimate on the grounds that he was an adulterer and a jew — crimes against the people, indeed! Internationalist solidarity and freedom for wage labour to struggle against capital clearly mean less to Joe Gormley than the petty comforts of a free holiday in Poland. By remaining silent while fellow miners arc locked up for demanding the right to organise in a free trade union Gormley has shown himself to be an enemy of the working class. Trade unionists have a name for the likes of Gormley: he is a scab.


Conspicuous Silence

When is a ‘ruthless imperialist invasion’ (Morning Star on the Americans in Vietnam) a case of freedom fighters (equipped with Russian tanks) extending the frontiers of socialism? When it’s Russian-aided Vietnam attacking China-backed Cambodia. Any comments from the Morning Star on this ruthless capitalist invasion in which many innocent people have been slaughtered for the sake of territorial expansion? How about a demonstration outside the Vietnamese embassy? Or even a ’Hands Off Phnom Penh' campaign? Communist Party hypocrisy?


Front Bench Socialists

Here’s a story which might turn a few faces red in the corridors of power. Not long after his resignation. Sir Harold Wilson was due to appear on a certain BBC radio programme for young people in which he was to answer questions from members of the public who made up the audience. Like most BBC operations, the audience was not entirely unselected and members of the ’youth sections’ of each of the major parties were invited to attend. At least, that’s what the BBC think happened. In fact, the producer of the programme mistakenly phoned the Head Office of the Socialist Party instead of the Labour Party. He asked for a bunch of ‘keen young socialists' to go along to Broadcasting House for the recording of the programme. He even said that Wilson was particularly anxious that the socialists should sit in the front row where he could see them. Never ones to disappoint the old and needy, a group of young members of the SPGB turned up at Broadcasting House. Wilson’s smile temporarily dropped when one SPGBer asked him how he had the nerve to call himself a socialist. Oddly enough, no one else from the front row was asked to speak after that.


Nothing To Fear

Another man who wouldn’t have much faith in Wilson’s ‘socialism’ is Peter Tebbutt. Writing in the January issue of Socialist Organiser he says:

   Over and over again Labour in office shows a distinct leaning towards capitalist organisation. Ministerial advisers and appointees are drawn from the ranks of the business and professional classes. Little wonder that the aspirations of the working classes (sic) never reach fulfilment. Capitalism certainly has nothing to fear from a Labour Government . . .

Mr. Tebbutt is prospective parliamentary candidate for the Labour Party for Falmouth and Camborne. Come the next General Election he will be asking workers to elect a Labour Government which will never fulfil their aspirations. The SPGB agrees with Mr. Tebbutt that Labour cannot solve the problems of the vast majority. But we. oddly enough, advise workers not to vote Labour. Perhaps it’s because we put political honesty before personal ambition.


All Honourable Men?

With the police hoping to persuade Lord Kagan back to England to help with their enquiries into some very large currency fiddles, yet another of the businessmen ennobled in Harold Wilson’s resignation honours list is receiving some unwanted publicity.

The last of Wilson's noblemen to suffer this was Eric Miller, a property tycoon who shot himself as the Fraud Squad were closing in on him.

The Labour ex-Prcmier seems to have had a mutual help arrangement with the likes of Kagan and Miller. Wilson’s affection for his Gannex mac probably did a lot for Kagan's raincoat business and the happy friendship was scaled by his making Kagan a Life Peer.

It was only a few spoilsports like backwoods aristocrats and nasty-minded newshounds who wondered whether this sort of thing was a misuse of the Honours List. Wilson might have reminded them that it was all in tradition: the English aristocracy was largely born from the more successful pirates and bandits of mediaeval England and grew up on such inhumanities as the slave trade and the Industrial Revolution.

Honours are awarded for long service to British capitalism, which is why trade union leaders often find themselves, in the twilight of their days, sitting in the House of Lords. Capitalism is itself a massive crime—the depriving of the majority of people of the wealth they produce—a fact which, to say the least, tends to blur the distinction between what capitalism says is lawful and that which it outlaws.

By capitalism's standards, the likes of Kagan and Miller were ripe to receive some entitlement to dress up in outdated and inconvenient clothes, as a formal recognition of what they represent. Their support for the Labour Party—and the reward they received for it—may give food for thought to that dwindling band of Labour supporters who still think their party has something to do with a society where people will stand in equality.

Steve Coleman

"Gone are the days" - TU Leader in Distress (1973)

From the July 1973 issue of the Socialist Standard

Joe Gormley, the President of the Mineworkers' Union, has now had a dose of second thoughts. From being a dangerous and inflammatory militant intent on “wrecking the country” by a General Strike he has now become, according to the same News of the World, regarded “as a moderate”.

Gone are the days (only a few weeks ago) when nothing but “an immediate General Strike” to oust the Tory Government would suit him; and the Editor of the News of the World was calling on the General Council of the TUC to “drag him back from the brink”. So far from calling on trade unions to mount a General Strike, he is now calling on Ted Heath to “get back to free bargaining”. Which only goes to show how empty and meaningless all this fierce-sounding talk about General Strikes really is.

The point of his current piece in the News of the World (12th May) is to plead with Heath in the forthcoming round of talks with the TUC to “stop the rent increases and scrap the Industrial Relations Act”. If the Government will do this AND deal with inflation and “rising prices of basic foods like meat, bread, milk, butter and potatoes”, he is sure the unions “will deliver the goods”.

What a change of heart! No more “kick out the Tories”, “General Strikes to elect a new Government”, and so on, etc. He claims that the reason his own miner members voted against strike action this year is “because they were a wee bit tired from last year’s little effort”. The miners were not made tired by striking. Every worker engaged in heavy laborious manual work welcomes a strike as a short break or relief from physical exhaustion. The reason the miners voted against strike action this Spring was because they had not yet settled the debts the last strike landed them in.

In other words, the employers will always beat the workers at the strike game, if the situation is such that they are determined to. The miners showed that they are powerful enough industrially to paralyze industry and force the employers to concede. The employers will do so if they think it cheaper than a fight to a finish.

“All workers want”, Gormley writes, “is more money to meet the rise in the cost of living, plus a little extra on top to raise their living standards.” “Give us,” he whines, “the right to negotiate our pay increases. That way, we’ll have far less industrial trouble than with the Government ramming its pay policy dowN our throats.”

Five weeks previously he was shouting for the General Strike; now, less “industrial trouble”. As a cute and canny, experienced trade-unoin leader, he realizes, from the vote of his own members and the futility of the May 1st demonstration, that the practical possibility of political strikes is, at the moment, nil. He has backed away from “the brink”.

Regarding his presumption to speak for "all workers want”, we have only this to say. Probably he is right that the great majority of workers “only” want more money plus a little increase. Actually they would all prefer a big increase, but don’t dare to think of it.

Those trade unionists who are Socialists do not want merely wage increase, large or small, welcome though these may well be; but the abolition of the wages system. But here, unfortunately, Poor Old Joe, as a practical union leader, is a bit out of his depth. 

Horatio.

Not another Labour Party (1968)

From the January 1968 issue of the Socialist Standard

Some trade unionists, fed up with Labour's increasingly obvious anti-working class stand, have suggested that the unions should once again set up their own party. For, of course, this was how the Labour Party began. At the turn of the century union leaders, alarmed at the anti-union bias of the Courts, took up the suggestion of men like Keir Hardie for a party, independent of both the Liberals and the Tories, to represent Labour. It was not until 1918 that individuals could join the Labour Party. Before then the Party was little more than a trade union parliamentary pressure group (generally backing the Liberal government).

It has always been Labour's claim to be the political arm of the Trade Union Movement. This claim is wearing a bit thin now. But many unionists still accept that the unions needs some political arm. If the Labour Party no longer represents them, why not set up another party?

In May 1966 Danny McGarvey, the boilermakers' leader, said that the unions might have to put up their own men against some official Labour candidates. Last November, Joe Gormley, the Lancashire miners' leader, suggested that, in view of the Labour government's policies, the miners and others might have to consider forming a new party — "a trade union party". Of course Gormley, a member of the Labour Party's National Executive Committee, did not really mean this. Only a few days later he was elected chairman of the NEC's organisation sub-committee (which deals with discipline). All the same he did start off some discussion. A few miners' lodges did break with Labour. Pottery Workers' Union secretary Alfred Dulson, whose union has already stopped financing Labour, said:

I am sure this is the way trade unionists have got to go. The Labour Party no longer represents the interests of trade unions (Financial Times, 13 November 1967).

But the Scottish miners' leader, Lawrence Daly, wrote in the Morning Star of 17 November:

Withdrawal of the political levy is a mistake which can bring joy only to the Conservative Party and the millionaire press. The suggestion that miners might have to consider forming a new trade union party is totally irresponsible.

Daly's love for Labour is only recent. Unlike McGarvey and Gormley he did not just talk about opposing Labour; he actually did so. After leaving the so-called Communist Party Daly and some supporters set up a "Fife Socialist League". In 1958 he defeated Labour (and Communist) candidates to become a county councillor and in the 1959 General Election he polled nearly 5,000 votes in West Fife against the sitting Labour man or, as he would have put it, the Labourite. One of the reasons he gave as to why miners should vote for him was that W. W. Hamilton. the Labour MP, had refused to support a miners' wage demand! But times change and Daly is himself now a Labourite.

Of course trade unionists and workers generally have nothing to gain from supporting Labour. And of course they need to take political action to solve their problems. The question is: what sort of political action? To suggest setting up another party along the lines of Labour is stupid. For the Labour Party, by its very nature, was doomed to failure from the start. It has failed to protect the interests of the working class—and has in fact done just the opposite—not through any lack of sincerity but because any party that takes on the task of governing under capitalism must face the fact that capitalism is a class system and that it runs on profits. Governments must protect this system so that inevitably they are brought into conflict with the working class. This was the whole  fallacy of Labourism. It held that a party of workers could run capitalism differently from a party of businessmen or landowners. But, as experience has shown, they cannot.

Labour MP's are not elected on a Socialist (many are too scared even to use the word in their vote-catching campaigns) but on a reform programme. Returned to power all they can do is, as Mr. Wilson never tires of telling us, to govern, to keep capitalism going. In the process even mild reform plans and links with workers' organisation go by the board.

What is needed is not another Labour Party but a Socialist party: a party that is quite opposed to capitalism: a party that takes its stand on the interests of workers elsewhere; a party that struggles for Socialism and nothing less. Such a party already exists in the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

Adam Buick

One of us (1982)

From the April 1982 issue of the Socialist Standard