Capitalism and apartheid (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

Many political analysts of South Africa have seen in the Afrikaner based National Party the political representative of landed interests with the mainly British United Party and the more radical Progressive Party being concerned largely with the mining and industrial interests. This view has usually been developed along the negative line, of what a capitalist-orientated party would not do. It is suggested that since apartheid, the acclaimed ideal of the Nationalists, would be disastrous for the economic prosperity of South Africa in today's industrial and viciously competitive world, it could not possibly form the policy of a capitalist party.

True as this statement is, it is only of minor relevance to present political realities in South Africa. Firstly it should be noted that fully fledged apartheid (separate self-governing states for each of South Africa’s ethnic groupings), is treated by the National Party in much the same way as the Russian Communist Party treats communism. It is an ‘ultimate’ aim which stays far from achievements, whether the year is 1948 or 1970: a conscience absolver whose only practical evidence is a scattering of Bantu reserves constituting one seventh of South Africa’s territory in the worst and most backward areas.

The National government proves as well as anyone the impossibility of reconstituting the old tribal institutions amongst Africans in the reserves, for they have long since been smashed through the combined effects of military conquest, Christianity and urbanisation. It makes no attempt beyond social discrimination to constitute the Indian, Coloured, Malay or Chinese derived sectors of the population into self-sustaining territories. The situation is well summed up by this extract from the 1967 Unesco report on apartheid.

  In spite of the ideology of apartheid, in spite of the uprooting of thousands of families, the complete separation of peoples into tribal ethnic groupings in South Africa has proved impossible. The closely integrated economic structure. the location of all the major industries, ail the mineral wealth, all the important harbour facilities, and all the best arable land in that part of South Africa which was outside the reserves in white ownership, meant that Africans — as well as Coloured and Asians —remain dependent on the town and farming complex of White South Africa for a livelihood . . . In fact, whatever the stated policy of the Government, there has been an increasing number of Africans admitted to urban areas.

While early Afrikaner nationalism could be more easily attached to the interests of a land owning farmer class distinct from mining and industrial capitalists, drawing as it did nearly all its support from the country districts or plateau land, this is not the case with the National Party variety. The Nationalists certainly captured the plateau land vote, but their rise to power really came through the impetus from the urban working class.

In particular the Thirties depression, together with a severe drought which drove thousands into the towns looking for jobs, in competition not only with the skilled British workers but also many industrially trained non-Europeans, provided the political base from which the National Party grew. These Afrikaner workers carried with them many of the out-dated customs and political prejudices of the country and incorporated them into a political ideology which grew from the discipline of urban industrial life.

Once established, the National Party was able to detach quite a large section of the British working class vote that had formerly gone to the racist Labour Party. Electoral pacts were made between the two organisations and the first National Party government relied for its power on the balance held by the Labour Party members. Having used the Labour Party to get into the seat of power it then discarded it. The Nationalists had the racism and anti-capitalist slogans of the Labour Party; the Unionist and later the United Party had its British patriotism, so the Labour Party quietly faded away, having nothing better to offer.

The British industrialists have long supported, vocally and financially, the United Party rather than the Nationalists and the latter have made propaganda of this among both urban and country workers, but this in itself does not brand the Nationalists as anti-capitalists in the general sense. Afrikaner nationalism saw itself being attacked on two fronts. Firstly, by the colonialist interference of British imperialism and secondly, by the opposing nationalisms of the African and Indian. To deal with the first it was seen as essential to build up a strong industrial South Africa, and to deal with the second to develop apartheid. Here was the Nationalists’ dilemma, for the first policy inevitably came into conflict with the second. The result was a compromise of sorts; strict apartheid was thrown out, but there were increasing measures of social discrimination in housing, health and political rights.

Having said that the National Party is not establishing strict apartheid, which would be disastrous for industrial development, it still remains a fact that policies pursued by the regime have not helped the development of South Africa’s industrial potential. In particular they have, through a combination of Pass laws, segregation in residential areas, repression of trade unions etc., bolstered with state power the system of migratory labour. This system was common during early industrialisation, but unusual and highly unsuitable to the commercially complicated and automated structure of modern capitalism. Such a structure requires a trained, disciplined and reliable work force and this can only be approached where workers are permanently resident in urban areas, settled in their family relations and having the inducement to involve themselves in industry. The migratory labour system prevents this by herding workers together in all male compounds, or male ghettos, by denying them political right in urban areas, and by turning their attention back towards their small patch of land on the reserve. The result, as H. R. Barrows has explained, is that:

   Though the traditional structure of the African family and tribal life is disintegrating because of its inadequacy when brought into close contact with the developing exchange economy with its implicit wage system, its breakdown is being protracted by the system of segregation and migrant labour. The social disadvantages of sudden disruption have been avoided at the cost of delaying specialisation. As a result, there is to-day no self supporting peasant economy, no permanent agricultural labour force, and no stable urban population.

Labour turnover in South African industry is enormous, compared with similarly industrialised areas elsewhere in the world. The Tomlinson Commission recorded turnovers of 117 per cent in a period of ten months in Johannesburg around 1948 and Sheila Van der Horst a figure of 138 per cent in East London generally, with 600 per cent in the building industry around 1957.

The National government is committed to the further industrial expansion of South Africa, but it is hampered by an out-dated political ideology, which it can only enforce by a massive system of state repression. It is a capitalist party since it governs a country completely dominated by capitalism, and a long way from the agricultural economy of the old Boers. Afrikaner farmers have themselves invested in industry, merging more and more into a common capitalist class, and there has been a significant growth in state corporations, and state financed industries under the Nationalists. While the removal of all racial barriers in employment and political rights might well advance industry in South Africa tremendously, such a course should not necessarily be expected in the immediate future. Further repression might lead to a bloody revolt, yet it may well be the fear of the existing native white ruling class in South Africa of such a revolt that causes them to support National Party policies. Capitalism would not fall through such a revolt but the existing capitalists might well be turfed out. Even the United Party is aware of this and has retained from the days of Smuts’ leadership a less rigorous policy of “separation” of the different ethnic groups. Only the now dissolved Liberal Party has openly demanded a multi-racial society, and in this they have only really represented the hopes of foreign capital for a greater field of exploitation in South Africa.

Mike Ballard

'Anti-apartheid' denounced (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

Anti-apartheid was denounced as a slogan of British imperialism at a meeting in Conway Hall, London, on 16 March addressed by I. B. Tabata, President of the Unity Movement of South Africa and N. Honono, President of the All-African Convention (a constituent organisation of the Unity Movement).

The South African ruling class, argued Tabata (what follows is only a summary of his arguments not an exact report of his speech), was split over how to govern the millions of African workers and peasants on whose labour the South African capitalist economy rested. The bulk of the industrial wealth of South Africa was owned either by capitalists from Britain or the English-speaking section of the White population. British imperialism had come to realise that it was no longer necessary to govern places like India and Africa by means of direct colonial rule. They had learned that it was cheaper and less inconvenient to rule through “independent” governments. However the bulk of the South African electorate, made up of White workers and farmers, was Afrikaans-speaking and traditionally opposed to British imperialism. They followed the lead of the Nationalist Party which preached that the only way to govern the Africans was by police methods. Brutal apartheid was the implementation of this policy of suppression. This the British capitalists and their counter-parts in South Africa, like gold magnate Oppenheimer, regarded as unnecessary and even dangerous in that it could provoke unrest and violence that would endanger their investments. They would prefer to rule through the White opposition parties (with their policy of less rigid segregation) or even, if necessary through organisations like the African National Congress. The “anti-apartheid" campaign by obscuring the class struggle of the African peasants and workers against capitalist exploitation and oppression, served their interests. As the Unity Movement put it in their pamphlet The Revolutionary Road for South Africa:

  In terms of the South African set-up, anti-apartheid means anti-Afrikaner Nationalist Government. It means the return to power of the English speaking sections. It means the entrenchment of imperialism in South Africa and all that that connotes for the exploitation of the mass of the Black population.

This is an analysis which the Socialist Party of Great Britain would largely endorse and is one reason why we do not take part in single-issue campaigns such as “Boycott South African Goods” and "Stop the Cricket Tour”. It is in fact in line with what we ourselves have long argued: that the rigid apartheid imposed by a government drawing its support from a farm-orientated electorate is a hindrance to the development of capitalism in South Africa and is against the interests of both the South African capitalist class and the international capitalists who have investments there. We have always rejected the facile view that apartheid is imposed by these capitalists in order to protect their investments.

The Socialist Party is of course opposed to apartheid, but to separate the struggle against apartheid and other forms of oppression and discrimination from the general struggle for Socialism (which will mean the emancipation of all mankind, irrespective of race or sex) is to play into the hands of that section of the South African ruling class that is opposed to apartheid.

We also have fundamental criticisms of the programme and policy of the Unity Movement, which is heavily influenced by obsolete trotskyist ideas about Russia and China being “workers states”, about leadership and "transitional demands” and about guerilla warfare. Nevertheless, on the issue of anti-apartheid, we concede that they take up a basically correct position. Wc doubt however whether their supporters in this country, who include Tariq Ali, really understand the full implications of this line of argument.

Another look at law and order (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

During the next few months we shall all have to exercise considerable patience and understanding. All our politicians are going to be under a great strain. Everything they say will have to be assessed with due regard for the fact that a general election is not far off. They are all looking for a vote-catching Election Issue.

The Conservatives are probably rather happy about the votes they hope to win over the issue of Law and Order. This is a fine, upstanding, majestic phrase which has the added advantage of meaning almost anything the user likes. The Fascists use it to mean cracking down on coloured immigrants, with the implied conclusion that this would at once clean up all the brothels and drug-pushing. For the Tories, Law and Order is a convenient political weapon to use against the government. Quintin Hogg recently displayed their policy, like a salesman showing his samples, when he said, and at the same time did not say, that the Labour government is responsible for a higher crime rate.

It is so widely accepted that crime is increasing that to question it seems almost as crankish as questioning whether the earth is a sphere. As the criminal statistics come out they show an average annual increase in indictable offences known to the police of something like 7 per cent. The overall picture shows that, after a period of relative stability at the beginning of the century, the crime figures rose steadily; between 1915 and 1930 by an average of 5 per cent a year, between 1931 and 1948 by 7 per cent. For the years 1949 to 1954 there was an overall decrease, then the figure starts going up again. Between 1955 and 1965 it was 10 per cent; after a levelling off in 1967 it fell to 7 per cent in 1968 but for last year it is likely to have reached 10 per cent again. About 37.000 people are at present in prison, borstal or detention centre — and again this figure is rising, despite the attempts, for example the introduction of suspended sentences in the 1967 Criminal Justice Act, to cut the population behind bars.

So we have the popular hysteria that England, which was once tranquil and law-abiding, is now become a paradise for layabouts, junkies, sexual deviants, violent gangsters, all supported by massive handouts from the Welfare State presided over by sloppy penal reformers. Wc might expect that the judiciary should be in the vanguard of this reaction. Like Mr. Justice Eveleigh. wondering at York Assizes earlier this year whether "our attitude to crime and the criminal” was partly responsible for the increase in crime and violence. The judges are usually closely followed by the police in such sentiments. Robert Mark, deputy commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, recently complained (The Guardian 26/3/70) that the criminal law acts now as a frustration to the police instead of their ally.

However, a cold eye cast upon the crime wave may see it rather differently. Something like 3 per cent of recorded crime can be called serious. Sex and violence offences are never more than 5 per cent of the total. There are three or four homicides for each million of the population each year. As a whole, this country is reasonably peaceful. Old ladies — even judges — can sleep safe in their beds.

This leads to a more fundamental questioning of the crime statistics. First, let us be clear that the figures record only crimes which are known to the police, which means that almost certainly they are an underestimation. They are also susceptible to many other subjective influences, like a change in the method of recording or a temporary campaign by the police, energised by a chief constable with a zeal for hunting down a particular crime, or by a decline in public tolerance of it.

Legislation can itself also have an effect on the crime figures. On one side of the balance, an Act can reduce a crime rate by simply legalising something which was previously illegal. On the other side, a new law can create a new crime, as rationing spawned the black market and as the Theft Act widened the definition of indictable crime. Somewhere in this field is the example of the Children and Young Persons Act of 1933. This Act provided a gentler method of dealing with juveniles before the courts and this is widely held to be the encouragement which led to the rise in recorded juvenile crime after 1933.

What do the statistics, so widely quoted, so freely used, really register? Crime is not a static thing, to be related to a sort of moral index which eternally condemns some actions as criminal. It is an activity which can only be socially defined. So how do we define it, how do we measure it? Here we meet the first problem, because any definition or measurement might be dealing with some other social breakdown or development which is expressed in crime. It might be dealing with a slump, a war, the growth of towns — even something like an increase in hire-purchase trading.

One example of this is in the rise of the self-service store and the supermarket. These have vastly expanded the opportunities of the shoplifter and one well-informed source has it that a fall-off in shop-lifting causes some supermarkets to question the attractiveness of their displays. So what does an increase in shoplifting really register? An increase in criminality among foreign students and depressed, middle-aged women? Or more skilful marketing snares by the shop management?

Supermarkets are another step in the process of town development, which goes back a very long time. There were periods of intense growth; for example during the years 1821 to 1831 the population of Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham and Leeds grew at least four times as fast as England as a whole.

There are plenty of accounts of what happened then, as the people poured into the towns, looking for somewhere to live and something to live on. In a word, they placed a strain on the social structure which it was not equipped to resist. Crime which was suited to an urban setting — prostitution, pocket-picking, shoplifting — flourished, and was checked only by urban organisation against it. One account of London in 1829 says:

   Street robberies have multiplied in the metropolis to a dangerous extent, and are perpetrated in the most daring manner. Gentlemen have frequently their watches plucked out of the fob, or their pocket-book or purse snatched or cut away, in the most crowded thoroughfares . . .

At the same time, to complete the picture, the towns supplied the resources to support their crime — a network of receivers and the notorious rookeries, where criminals could take refuge among the dense maze of festering alleyways and courtyards.

This is one example of the growth of crime in fact measuring some other social pressures. Another, more up to date, is in the increased possession and use of those drugs which the law defines as dangerous (there are plenty of dangerous ones which are legal; and although some of the illegal drugs are extremely dangerous it is another story, why the law legalises some dangerous activities and forbids others.) The use of drugs, in most cases, is a symptom of a dissatisfaction with society. Perhaps it is a matter of a massive frustration — a common enough thing in the suppressive, insecure world of capitalism. Or perhaps a sharpened sense of alienation from human priorities — of the boredom and futility of a lifetime of employment and the prostitution of our abilities to the one aim of getting and holding down a job.

The magistrate who cracks down on the cannabis smoker is not required — and rarely shows any sign of wanting — to consider such aspects of the “offence". In this, he is expressing some of the popular hysteria over Law and Order. We might expect, as in most cases where moral stands are taken up, to find some double standards. Few people can claim not to have offended sometime against capitalism’s laws — not to have bilked on fares, or kept money they have found, or not told the shop assistant who has given them too much change. Then there is the vast amount of “white collar” crime — fiddling expense accounts, “adjusting” the petty cash book — which goes undetected or, if discovered, is hushed up.

Capitalism, like other social systems, erects its own morals on its economic basis. The morals of capitalism are those of private property and as property is essentially a matter of minority privilege it follows that the unprivileged majority are all potential offenders against those morals. One thing which can be said with certainty is that about 90 per cent of crime consists of offences against property. This is not to say that criminals, whether hardened or petty, are a threat to the property system. They are as much in favour of capitalism as any dogged Tory; they are only interested in adjusting the balance of possession in their favour and are ready to break the rules to do so.

The phrase Law and Order illustrates that one is considered inseparable from the other. (In fact some actions — for example smoking pot — can be orderly but illegal and others — for example a war effort — can be legal but disorderly.) By order capitalism means an acceptance of its own social structure, morals and priorities. It means that the vast majority must accept their inferior status as wage slaves, keeping any efforts to defend or improve their conditions within defined limits. It also means that industry and transport can pollute, even destroy, the environment in the name of profit, with virtually no legal method of preventing them doing so. It means that politicians can break their promises, or adopt policies for which they have never asked for a mandate, and all this must be accepted. It means that everyone must conform to the pattern of a docile, respectable zombie who may have boiling frustrations but who never allows them to spill over.

If we accept that there is now more crime than ever before, this is another way of saying that capitalist society exerts a fiercer pressure than ever before and that the lives of its people are more unsatisfactory than ever before. Only a small part (about 3 per cent) of crime is the organised work of professional criminals. Most of it consists of actions, or gestures, which are the result of acute deprivations or alienation. In capitalist society, with its family structure and its wage labour system, with its privilege and suppressions, it is all too easy to fall into the sorry ranks of the deprived or to become a cast-out, unemployable and therefore unwanted.

This is a social problem, as virulent as any of those the reformers claim to have eradicated. It is usual for such problems, at some time in their lives, to become material for vote-catching politicians. So it is with Law and Order. Craftily, the government have pushed through measures like the abolition of hanging and the Misuse of Drugs Bill some time before the election, in the hope that such provocations to punitive workers will be forgotten when the votes come to be cast. Equally craftily, the Tories harp on the theme, encouraging the idea that crime can be reduced by the imposition of harsher penalties. (If it were that easy there would be a lot fewer ulcers in the Home Office.)

This may be all very well for the politicians but the rest of us are left with the unpleasant fact that Law and Order, like racialism, is a bandwagon which once rolling will be difficult to stop. At all events it will do damage along the way — and not only capitalism’s criminals will suffer under it.

Ivan

Free transport in London (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

One of the more obvious examples of the waste of capitalism is the common practice of making people buy a ticket before they can travel. Under this absurd procedure men and women are employed to issue pieces of paper for other men and women to punch holes in. People who cannot afford to pay for these tickets cannot use the buses and trains, while those caught travelling without one are liable to be brought before the magistrates and fined.

In a socialist society on the basis of common ownership travel, like everything else, would be free. Buses and trains would be provided for people to use as and when they wanted to.

Faced with this common-sense proposition many people are at a loss and can think of no sensible objection. They often do not know that even under capitalism public transport is provided as a free service in some places. Such people must have been thoroughly confused during the recent Greater London Council elections. For here there were Tories and Liberals, Labour and Homes Before Roads candidates, all saying that the GLC should run London Transport as a free service.

For instance, the “Homes Before Roads” group who stood in most boroughs declared:

  We believe that within the next ten years we will have to consider the idea of free public transport as a feasible solution to the congestion and pollution caused by the private motorist.

But it was not only amongst the minority party candidates that this was canvassed. In Islington, the idea had an able advocate in Councillor John Szemerey, a Tory. He wrote:

  It is six years since I first proposed to Conservative Central Office that public transport in London should be provided free as a public service, financed jointly from the Exchequer and from the rates. With all the resultant savings on manpower and machinery, increased mobility of labour and utilisation of public transport, and reduction in travel by private car, I still think there is a good case for this. (North London Press, 6 February).

When asked how much it would cost to provide free public transport in London the Tory GLC leader replied that “the abolition of fares on London Transport’s red buses and Underground trains would be equivalent to a rate of 3s. 4d. in 1970, or approximately £30 a year for the average householder’’ (North London Press, 6 March).

Szemerey’s Labour opponents in Islington were delighted. They challenged him to say he stood for “a 3s. 4d. a rate increase to make travel free on all the London Transport buses and Underground trains”, an obvious appeal to what they thought were popular prejudices against the idea. In Camden, incidentally, the same challenge was made to the Liberals by a Tory — a revealing illustration of the sham that conventional party politics is.

Szemerey replied, arguing in effect that even from a capitalist standpoint his proposal could be justified:

  My point was that the savings from having no tickets (savings in manpower, materials and machines) put together with the savings on road maintenance and improvements (many more would use free public transport and leave their cars at home) might well justify a totally new look at public transport policy and treating it as a public service paid from local and national taxation (rates and Exchequer).
  The statement by the leader of the GLC that free red buses and undergrounds in London would cost a 3s. 4d. rate or some £30 per year for the average householder, if paid entirely from the rates underlines my point. The balance of payments from rates and Exchequer still needs to be worked out, but even if paid entirely from the rates £30 a year per household would present an actual saving for most families . . . And for the old, who nowadays have to think twice before spending 6d. on a bas fare, it would open a new life. They could visit friends, go to the shops, make outings to museums or parks all at no direct cost to themselves (Islington Gazette, 20 March).

Because abolishing tickets was proposed by a conventional politician it got this serious hearing. Nobody suggested that, with free access to transport, there would not be enough seats for everyone. Or that the buses and trains would be jammed full of people travelling nowhere in particular just because it was free.

Free travel on London Transport has nothing to do with Socialism, as the fact that it finds such a keen advocate in a Tory shows. It would merely be another reform which, with class ownership and the wages system continuing, would exert a downward pressure on wage levels.

It is the implications of some of Councillor Szemerey’s arguments that are of particular interest. He argues that resources would be saved since there would no longer be any need for tickets, ticket machines, ticket collectors or accounts, and that people who now cannot afford to travel too often will have this restriction on their enjoyment of life removed.

But these arguments can be applied with equal validity outside transport. Think of the saving if other things like food and clothes and housing were to be provided free. There would be no need for any cashiers or accountants or bank clerks or security guards or rent collectors or salesmen. The list is almost endless since very many people are employed in jobs which have to do with the buying and selling rather than the actual production of wealth. There would be no need either for cash registers, safes, counting machines or sales ledgers. The saving would be enormous and could go some way towards providing the extra things that people would ask for if prices were abolished.

What an indictment of capitalism it is that there are old people who, as Councillor Szemcrey admits, “have to think twice before spending 6d. on a bus fare”. These same people also have to think twice before spending money on the food and clothes they buy and on the rooms they rent. The abolition of price-tags really would open up "a new life” for them.

Of course free access to wealth according to need is not possible as long as a privileged few own the means of production. It would first require a real social revolution changing the basis of society from class to common ownership, as opposed to the comparatively trivial reform Councillor Szemcrey proposes. It is up to him to explain why his proposal to abolish prices is restricted to transport. He must say why he wants to go on wasting society’s resources on the trappings of buying-and-selling and why he still wants to force old people to pay for the food and shelter they need.

Adam Buick

Tories win again (1970)

Party News from the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Tories retained control of the Greater London Council in the elections on 9 April. Once again over three-quarters of a million electors had a chance to vote directly for Socialist candidates. As expected, in a low poll, only a thousand or so did.

This was the first large-scale election in Britain where Party names appear (not loo prominently however) on the ballot papers. Our 14 candidates used the description “The Socialist Party of Great Britain". We were in fact the only people to use the word “socialist" at all, a fact which should help our campaign to stop the Press and Tories referring to the Labour Party as such. A Party spokesman was also interviewed for three minutes on Thames Television on 24 March. This was the first time the Party case has been presented on television in London, though it had been put a number of times in other regional programmes. We have yet to be allowed a formal Party Political Broadcast or even an appearance on a national television programme.

Two other incidents are worth recording. In Camden, at a meeting on transport held on 23 March, the Labour candidate, Luke O'Connor, was the first to protest when he was mistakenly introduced by the chairman as the candidate of "the socialist party". At another meeting in Ealing on 2 April, in which all the parties in the election there took part, the candidates of the so-called Communist Party and Oswald Mosley’s Union Movement sat next to each other. This contrasts with the attitude the Communist Party adopted towards a meeting at Bristol University on 23 January which their candidate at the Swindon parliamentary by-election refused to attend on the grounds that the general secretary of the Union Movement had also been invited. It would seem to show that the Communist Party has come to realise that, as our speaker at the Bristol meeting pointed out, debating with fascists in no way condones their views but is in fact a way of opposing them.

In Haringey a group of anarchists put up six candidates for the three seats under such labels as the “Bread and Circus Party” and the "All Night Party" in order to demonstrate their mistaken view that elections are a fraud and a farce. Their candidates are shown as A in the results below; HBR means “Homes Before Roads", a single-issue reform group:

CAMDEN: O'Connor (Lab) 26,265, Collins (Lab) 26,140, Kazantzis (Lab) 25,731, Lemkin (C) 24,416, Townsend (C) 24,346, Mansel (C) 24,047, Calmann (L) 2,565, Peacock (L) 2,252, Benad (L) 2,208, McLennan (Comm) 1,692, Peacock (HBR) 1,311, Walker (HBR) 1,249, Jacka (HBR) 1,037, Cox (Soc) 391, Davies (Soc) 323, Grant (Soc) 299, Elliott (UM) 195.

EALING: Dobson (C) 43,219, Farrow (C) 43,130, Patterson (C) 42,904, Young (C) 41,608, Hughes (Lab) 35,206, Eckles (Lab) 34,983, Mason (Lab) 34,955, Newson (Lab) 34,299, Lewisohn (L) 3,195, Davies (L) 3,165, Hankinson (L) 3,026, Bailey (L) 2,804, Foley (HBR) 2,010, Greeves (HBR) 1,683, St. George (HBR) 1,626, Spence (HBR) 1,594, Tank (Comm) 1,190, George (Soc) 735, Wilson (UM) 708, Buchanan (Soc) 695, Rose (Soc) 392, Sawyer (Soc) 293.

HARINGEY: Bains (C) 26,716, Gilbey (C) 26,471, Malynn (C) 26,156, Chaplin (Lab) 25.625. Morrisey (Lab) 24.949. Gurr (Lab) 24,890, Fox (L) 1.997, Parker (L) 1,928, Edwards (L) 1,910. Morris (Comm) 1,337. Ramsay (Comm) 982. Hicklin (HBR) 461. Phillips (HBR) 458, Carter (Soc) 443, Buick (Soc) 374. Thompson (HBR) 353, Cooper (A) 234, Waite (Soc) 212, Borowski (A) 212, Whittaker (A) 154, Kibble (A) 149, Summers (UM) 145, Kerner (A) 133, Hood (A) 77.

LAMBETH: Geddes (C) 34,111. Grieves (Lab) 33,936, Crofton (C) 33,918, Livingston (C) 33,868. Gumbel (C) 33,774, Jones (Lab) 33,738, Chesworth (Lab) 33.645. Ponsonby (Lab) 33,045, Delaney (L) 1,952. Beaven (L) 1,847, Larkin (L) 1,784, Barker (L) 1,781, Grier (HBR) 1,186, Keelan (HBR) 1,100, Luckett (HBR) 1,004, Thomas (HBR) 956. Hope (Comm) 888, Styles (Comm) 745, Garnham (Soc) 620, Phillips (Soc) 536, Boaks (Ind) 366, Sansum (Soc) 337, Simkins (Soc) 295. Archer (UM) 293.

Cows massacred while people need milk (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

In accordance with the economics of capitalism. governments continue to finance the non-production and even the destruction of wealth in a bid to restore profit levels.

"Europe", claims the President of the Common Market's Agricultural Commission, “is drowning in a sea of milk and in a morass of butter”. (La Stampa, 8 February 1970). Even though butter stocks in the Common Market amount to one year’s British consumption it is not true to say that there is too much milk or butter in Europe compared with what people need. There are many especially in the immigrant shantytowns of France and Italy who lack enough of these basic foodstuffs. What Dr. Mansholt means is that more milk and milk products have been produced than can be sold at a profit

The only solution under capitalism, where production is geared to meeting market demand rather than human needs, is to get rid of the unprofitable surplus and to take steps to ensure that the productive system's capacity to produce abundance does not again disrupt the market and threaten profit levels. Accordingly, Common Market farmers are now being paid to destroy some of their cows and to feed milk to their pigs. Between 9 February and 30 April some 330,000 cows should have been slaughtered.

Left versus right (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

I have a friend, a professor of history at London University no less, who always has a criticism of the Socialist Party of Great Britain. It is that the process of attacking other parties and people on what is vaguely called the left is equivalent to splitting the ranks of the faithful and can only be good for the others, the anti-socialists.

It is an old argument, and one that we socialists have often had to deal with. It is one which is so clearly unsound that it should by now be impossible for anyone with an intelligent interest in politics like my friend to believe in it. But clearly it is still necessary to point out the fallacies involved. First, it should be obvious that the very concept of left and right in politics is now a figment of the imagination, whatever it was in terms of the seating accommodation in the Assemblies of the French Revolution. The concept of the parties being stretched out in a long line with the good boys who are eager to present Socialism to the long-suffering masses at one extreme, the left, while at the other you will find the die-hards and the reactionaries (more vague, hardly definable terms, of course).

This concept should surely never have survived the real life experience of the thirties. For what happened was that the two parties who were, according to the mythology, at the extreme ends of the line and never the twain shall meet, the Russian “communists” and the German Nazis, not only were able to meet but to embrace with as much fervent warmth as cynical, cold-blooded politicians can ever hope to generate.

In Germany before Hitler achieved power there were plenty of instances of the two extremes joining hands to dish their mutual opponents (Social-Democrats masquerading as socialists, Catholic Centrists etc.); while the notorious pictures of Ribbentrop and Molotov, the representatives of the extreme rightist Hitler and the extreme leftist Stalin, shaking hands with the utmost cordiality as they gave the green light for the Second World War with its slaughter of millions of workers the world over, will still be in the minds of many.

And before leaving this aspect, let nobody imagine that this handshake was a momentary affair which cooled after the two bandits had shared out the swag in Poland in 1939. On the contrary, as a recent letter in the Times mentioned, Stalin did not forget a year later to send his beloved Hitler his heartiest congratulations on his conquest of France, which meant that the whole of western Europe was in his hands — with all that that meant for millions of Jews and others (the others including, of course, “communists” who had faithfully supported Stalin in all his murders).

Indeed, the romance lasted forever and a day as far as the “communists” were concerned. Stalin was not so much the husband who is proverbially the last to know that his bride is faithless. He deliberately refused to listen to his own spies like Richard Sorge who gave him all the score of the music that Hitler was going to play in June 1941 so that the “communists” went on being faithful to the fascists right up to the time when the German ambassador told them the worst and Molotov asked what they had done to be treated like this !

It is clear then that the concept of a straight line is, if anything, a circle, so that although parties may move in seemingly opposite directions, sure enough, when the time is ripe, they find they have come round into each others’ arms. The Socialist Party firmly declares its implacable hostility to all other parties, all of whom are non-socialist (which means of course anti-socialist whatever the protestations, sincere or otherwise, of the individuals concerned). Any fragmentation which our activities may cause, wherever it may occur, on the so-called left or the so-called right, is not a matter for regret or shame. For what can possibly be wrong in socialists causing fragmentation of anti-socialists? Would that we were powerful enough to cause more such fragmentation!

Of course we are not unaware that this attitude seems harsh and unfair to many sincere but misguided people who would like us to play ball with them in their multitudinous efforts at improving the social scene with their piecemeal reform programmes. Recently I found myself involved in a long and heated argument with some students who had read some criticisms of their activities in the so-called anti-apartheid demo’s and were prepared to agree that there was some force in our contentions but nevertheless insisted that “the left” should stick together.

It is an attitude which flies in the face of all experience, much of it bitter. But it is one that seems to trap so many would-be socialists, old as well as young, professors as well as students and thus confuses the issue of Socialism, which can do with all the clarity it can get. And it may be worth a digression to mention that, in the same argument, I was told that the Socialist Party was not only to blame for attacking the left, it had compounded its sin by attacking the right! In debate with the fascists of the National Front.

We must be held guilty, it seems, because we deigned to attack them with words instead of with blows. We debated instead of using our fists (and no doubt knives and guns as well). This matter was ventilated at length in a recent issue of this journal but we make no apology for referring again to the vital issue of using free speech to demonstrate the superiority of the socialist case in front of a working class audience whom it is our job to convince.

We will only attain Socialism when the majority of the workers have learned to understand what it’s all about. And, for this, freedom of discussion is a must. Those who use their influence over the young to show that there are ifs and buts before this “must” are taking a grave responsibility for the atmosphere of intolerance they help to create.

Of course, to conclude, there is a line. A straight line. A line of battle. On one side are the people who stand for Socialism, the whole Socialism and nothing but Socialism as being the only way of ridding mankind of all the vicious social problems from which it suffers and of building a new world which is fit for human beings in the full sense of that term. On the other side are all the rest; whether they call themselves left, right, centre makes not an iota of difference. They are all on the wrong side of the line.

L. E.Weidberg

Letters: The Labour Theory of Value (1970)

Letters to the Editors from the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

The Labour Theory of Value

Sir,

I have not read in the Socialist Standard an explanation of the Labour Theory of Value, and since it is a theory to which objections are frequently made may I put to you the following four points.

(1) It is a basic .and apparently reasonable law of economics that when demand exceeds the supply the price of a commodity rises, and conversely, when supply exceeds demand, the price then falls. What role therefore does supply and demand play in determining value?

(2) Following from this it is suggested that if all the commodities used by man were supplied by nature either the intervention of human labour, and in the same proportions as they are now produced, then they would have the same exchange value as now. In other words if meteorites which occasionally fall, were really diamonds and could be picked up off the streets once in a lifetime, they would still have the same value, providing they were just as rare and could be obtained in no other way.

(3) Why should the value of works of art rise to such heights? An estimate of the value of the Mona Lisa puts its worth at nearly £36 million, and this can only be due to the painting’s rarity — the fact that it is unique, and the demand for it — the fact that it is one of the world’s most coveted treasures. The original labour involved was fixed for all time, and ought not therefore to have altered the value.

(4) Finally, does the capitalist by anticipating demand, and matching supply to demand. thereby reducing waste and needless expenditure of socially necessary labour, not contribute to the value of the commodity?

K. McCormack.

Belfast, 15.

Reply: 

It would be helpful to make a few definitions and give a brief outline of the Marxian Theory of Value before dealing with the points raised. By economics we mean the study of wealth production and distribution under capitalism. By wealth we understand useful goods and services (use values) produced by the application of human energies to the nature-given material of the earth. Under capitalism wealth is produced for sale with a view to profit, its unit being a commodity which in addition to use value also has exchange value. This form of society has not existed for all time but is the result of a long process of evolution. From the simple societies of pre-history where little or no exchange took place to the complex society of the 20th Century where activities are nothing but a continuous series of exchange transactions. Under capitalism the means of production are run co-operatively by the propertyless majority of the population whilst being owned and controlled by a non-working minority. The Labour theory of value not only shows what regulates the proportion in which commodities exchange but also the source of income of the owning capitalist minority.

As exchange is a social act value, which regulates this, is defined as a relationship between people which shows itself as a relationship between things. It has nothing to do with the physical properties (weight, colour, size, etc.) of commodities. It is the social labour embodied in commodities that gives them the common social property by which they may be compared. The value of a commodity is the amount of socially necessary labour required to produce it. Price is the monetary expression of value.

It is the working class who create value at the point of production. In order to get the necessities of life, they sell their labour power (skills and energies) to the capitalist. On average they get the value of their labour power: enough of the things needed to maintain themselves and their families (i.e. to produce and reproduce their labour power). But the value created by workers in production is more than the value of the labour power they have sold. This excess is known as surplus value and forms the source of the capitalist class’s income in the form of rent, interest and profit.

This brings us to the answer to question (4). A capitalist is someone who lives off rent, interest and profit. The capitalist does not play a role in trying to match supply and demand. This is done by workers, such as statisticians and market researchers, whose efforts are concerned with selling and maximising profits. Capitalism generates enormous waste over which neither capitalist or worker have any control. The only way a capitalist could contribute to the value of a commodity would be through being engaged in productive activities but as such would not be acting as a capitalist.

(1) It is price that varies according to supply and demand. When supply and demand are in equilibrium price and value are equal. Value varies according to the amount of socially necessary labour required to produce a commodity. Factors affecting value are the productivity of labour, and natural conditions like the fertility of the soil and ease of access to mineral wealth.

(2) This is an assumption we cannot accept. There is no commodity (wealth for sale with a view to profit) supplied by nature without the intervention of human labour. Air for instance is most useful to man and it is provided by nature without the intervention of human labour. It has no value or price and is not a commodity and is not private property. If everything were available from nature in the same way they would not be commodities.

As for meteorites, we know of none that have delivered anything useful that cannot be obtained here. For the sake of argument if it happened that a meteorite delivered “once in a lifetime" some useful material not previously known to man, there would be no means of applying theories of price or value (which deal with here everyday experience of capitalist production and distribution) to this. No doubt efforts would be made to reproduce the material synthetically. If successful, then the question of value would arise as we would be back to the familiar ground of labour power being expended in production. In the case of diamonds, efforts have been made to reproduce artificially what nature has produced naturally. For the capitalist it has proved better (cheaper) to have workers mining for diamonds, than making them artificially. If diamonds were to fall regularly as meteorites then their value would fall to the socially necessary labour spent in collecting them.

(3) As already explained the theory of value deals with everyday experiences of production in capitalist society. A commodity is not only produced once but is continuously reproduced. Works of art are unique and the prices put on them cannot be explained by economic theory. [That capitalism has to foul the things it finds most beautiful by putting prices on them is to be condemned.] The ‘Mona Lisa’ is no more rare than other paintings having much lower prices say the £500,000 recently paid for a Van Gogh. It will no more help us, if we could explain the conundrum of a price of £36 millions, than if we know the reason for Lisa's enigmatic smile!

Editorial Committee

Beyond Wages

Sir,

Among the multitude of wage and salary slaves, there are few indeed who look beyond striking for higher wages and salaries to a solution of their problems. Truly, that hypocritical slogan “A Fair Day’s Work for a Fair Day's Pay” has a lot to answer for!

Does our modern wage slave, crawling painfully into the Seventies really think he has “won” or yet "broken even” at the end of his day ?

On the contrary, he has "lost” on each occasion he accepts his wages. Why do we say this? Once a worker has worked — once his labour power has been expended, it has created a value greater than its own. But what he has produced this concealed labour within a given commodity, is the legal property of his employer, the capitalist, who thus has increased his original capital with the surplus-value donated by the sellers of the labour power generated in their carcases.

Despite these facts, we daily witness appeals for higher wages as the be-all and end-all of working class aspirations.

Certainly they must strike to protect their living standards, so long as capitalism remains, but if they desire to put an end to their status as suckers for the capitalist class, they must organise for the abolition of the wage system and the establishment of world Socialism. This will be an overdue end to human beings hawking their abilities, which is a degrading business.

G. R. Russell

A socialist view of Austrian politics (1970)

Party News from the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

We set out below part of the address of our Comrade Albert Kurz, fraternal delegate of the Bund Demokratsher Socialister to the Easter Conference of the Socialist Party of Great Britain.

We in Austria haven't a party with a long tradition as you have. And, Comrades, there is a great difference between the conditions you have here and we have. You in Britain have a long democratic parliamentary tradition. Though it is a bourgeois tradition, it is by means of this tradition easiest to spread the great idea of Socialism.

We in Austria, on the contrary haven’t that tradition. We have had one fascist government after another. People who were so-called reds, that means social democrats, were jailed in the year 1937. So they had to turn “blacks", that meant conservatives in order to earn their living. These were the years of the great depression. After the German invasion of Austria in 1938 both the reds and the blacks were jailed by the Nazis. They had to join the Nazi party to avoid persecution. After the year 1945 they were expelled from any public employment for having been Nazis. I don't want even to mention the time of the 19th century in which police spies put their noses in all affairs of public life.

So it is not a surprise that people in Austria haven’t faith in parliamentarians and democracy to the extent that a bourgeois government can be called democratic. So at least officially nobody is being persecuted for being a Socialist. Although many people arc afraid.

You see, these are the great barriers we have in our work.

People grew afraid of being mixed up with politics, for as I told you, they burned too often their hands.

In these conditions we have, we must do our best. We haven’t a paper for such a long time as you. For many years we had a duplicated paper which was published monthly. The last years we have a printed paper, but we can afford to publish it only four times a year.

50 Years Ago: Capitalism's darkest hour (1970)

The 50 Years Ago column from the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

We used to hear much more than we do now about the awful prospects that awaited the peoples of the world in the event of their deciding to substitute Socialism for capitalism. Not only were we to wade to our goal through a sea of blood, but we were to find, when we reached our Land of Promise, that instead of being a land flowing with milk and honey, it was a stoney and sterile desert. Famine and rape would stalk the land; anarchy and chaos would overwhelm humanity . . . We are moved to these remarks by the awful spectacle of human misery which capitalism in her very prime offers to our eyes. For some days there has appeared in orthodox Press a most agonising appeal for funds to relieve the starving multitudes of what are now called the famine areas of Europe. In this appeal the Statement is made that five million children are in danger of starvation, and we read this tragic announcement:

  “News is just to hand that only those children between three and five can be helped; the mites under three must be abandoned to starvation, for there will not be enough food to go round if these are included.” 

and it is commented, “It has been necessary deliberately to select which children shall be saved and which must be left to die.”

Those who have with such cool effrontery declared that Socialism could not feed her populations have here something to think about. The present system, with all its wonderfully fertile means of production, is helpless to prevent catastrophes . . . nay, it is not merely that it is unable to prevent them: it produces them.

(From an unsigned article in the Socialist Standard, May 1920.)

Violence in politics (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

The upsurge of violence in modern society probably means that “Law and Order” will be the most explosive single political issue of the 1970’s. What concerns socialists most is the political violence which has been seen of late in Paris, London, Tokyo and many large American cities. This has been carried out by large numbers of people, mostly young, who have the avowed intention of changing society and of even instituting “Socialism”. Indeed, many of these insurgents claim to adhere to the theories of Karl Marx. Not surprisingly, Marx is once again widely regarded as the apostle of violent revolution, barricades and fighting in the streets.

At a recent debate in Edinburgh the audience heard our opponent claim that Marx had never supported the use of the ballot in achieving Socialism and had always advocated using force of arms. Whether this statement was due to ignorance or “tactics” is unknown. We say Marx’s views on the revolutionary use of the ballot by the working class are not a matter for debate, they are a matter of record and were dealt with by us in the April issue of the Socialist Standard.

Why this obsession with violence, then? After all, it is only a few years since the emphasis in the protest movement was on the non-violent. The theme of the earlier Aldermaston marches was that “we shall overcome” by pacifist methods, a far cry from the bloodthirsty spectacle of recent Easters.

The key lies in the fact that as capitalism continues on its not-so-merry way its problems not only increase but intensify. For example, the Spanish Civil War pales to insignificance with its post-war parallel in Vietnam, and prior to 1939 the disarmers were aghast at the thought of submarines and mustard gas. Today, it is thermonuclear and bacteriological warfare.

Most of the current crop of “revolutionaries” came into politics through their disgust at one or another of capitalism’s evils. Many of them were originally supporters of the Labour Party and helped get it elected in the belief that this would be a step towards eliminating certain social problems. Of course, the reality has been very different. To many it has seemed that governments lack the will or are too treacherous to deal with the problems and that it doesn’t matter who the votes are cast for, the result is the same — human misery on a vast scale. Thus they come to the conclusion that the ballot is useless, a kiss on a piece of paper.

Is it as simple as that? Is it really lack of will that prevents governments solving the problems? The myth is that governments could take capitalism by the scruff of the neck if they really wanted to. Actually, it is the other way round. How can a government determine or forecast the actions of the rest of the world? And how can it deny — if it wishes to retain popular support — the wishes of the majority? For there is another myth dearly held by the protesters, that the majority is really on their side. The fact is that the majority either supports capitalism or can see no alternative way of running society except on a production for profit basis.

So, it is a lack of desire for Socialism (production for use) that keeps capitalism going. Governments have no choice but to run the system the best way they know how. The vote, then, is not necessarily useless. Rather it is like a razor which can be used to separate a man from his whiskers or his breath. Likewise, a vote can be a weapon of emancipation or self-inflicted wage slavery, depending on the man using it.

In their frustration the protesters must turn to solutions outside of majority support, and there is no lack of would-be leaders to provide such solutions from the rehashed theories of Lenin, Trotsky, Mao, etc., and their insistence that since all previous revolutions have been violent so must the next one be, too.

We deny this most unMarxian viewpoint on the grounds that the factors involved in revolutions do not remain constant. The bourgeois revolutions of 19th century Europe took place against a background where the bourgeois had no option but to take up arms. The existing legality was often undemocratic, so the only way to change things was by illegal means.

Also, these upheavals occurred when the level of weaponry was low by today’s standards. Then it was a case of rifle against rifle, horseman against horseman. In such a situation it was possible that revolutionaries fired by the “justice” of their cause and as well, or as poorly, armed as the mere hirelings of the state could take on and beat them. Nowadays, the situation is vastly different. No group outside of the state machine could possibly seize power in a modern country in the face of the sophisticated weaponry ranged against them. Much wiser to win control of the state machine first.

The most important changed factor is that previous revolutions have always been carried out in the interest of a minority who understood what was at stake. The socialist revolution will be the first one in the interest of a majority, so, along with Marx and Engels, we hold that the majority must also understand what is at stake.

In any case, those who have actually tried to seize power without first winning political control in more recent times have failed miserably. The May 1968 Paris affair was crushed without any real force having to be used. Probably the only shots fired came from the students, themselves. No tanks, aircraft or artillery were required. Indeed, this writer has a vivid memory of seeing on TV how a Paris Municipal street cleaning vehicle made short work of a barricade.

Ignoring the myth of Mussolini’s march on Rome, the most serious attempt was Hitler’s Munich putsch in 1923. The rebels were desperate, trained and armed men, many of whom had fought in world war one, and they constituted a more potent force than anything today’s barricadists are likely to provide. Through the streets of Munich they marched until confronted by the state machine in the form of some policemen armed only with rifles. A volley of shots rang out and some of the marchers fell dead or wounded. Alan Bullock, in his Hitler — A Study in Tyranny, tells of the ensuing panic and collapse of the putsch. Although Hitler dislocated his arm in the stampede to get away, his brain continued to function. There and then he realised that attempts to bypass the state machine were useless. From then on he set out to win the minds of the German electorate and to win power legally. Once this had been achieved the military had no option but to accept Nazi rule.

Of course, the widely held view among the “revolutionaries” is that it is impossible for socialists to capture the forces of the state; that in the event of a socialist majority the armed forces and the police will be used to cow that majority into submission. How valid is this idea?

Socialists claim that the idea of Socialism — a world without social classes in which the means of production will be commonly owned — is produced out of the revulsion of capitalism’s problems, its wars, crime, poverty, alienation. that the values and institutions of capitalism increasingly come into conflict with the growing desire of the working class to live in a society more in harmony with their needs. In short, socialist consciousness is a product of capitalism’s problems. Now, there is no evidence to suggest that members of the armed forces are any more backward than other workers in factories or offices. Their ideas are pretty much the same on matters of sport, sex or politics. They do not live in a vacuum.

So, how likely is the soldier to obey a command to suppress a socialist working class? Not so long ago this writer did his National Service and can, accordingly, speak from first-hand experience. Did we obey our officers because we loved them or regarded them as superior beings? Actually, a chief topic in the NAAFI any night of the week was what a useless shower officers were. Also, any officer issuing an order which we knew to be unauthorised could be safely, and often was, ignored. During the years of National Service the newspapers often carried exposures of servicemen being misused, supplied by the men themselves.

The reason why we obeyed the officers was that even we, without a socialist idea in our heads, knew that those in command are backed by the populace at large. The working class today, as before, thinks the armed forces are necessary, so, logically, it regards discipline as a must. Officers with no authority telling soldiers exposed to socialist ideas to do what they certainly won’t want to do — shoot their own families — will be more likely to have the arms turned on them!

The most urgent task, then, for those who wish to abolish capitalism and institute Socialism, is to organise with others of like mind. No need to form another organisation when the Socialist Party of Great Britain has been in existence for 66 years. There is a great need to carry the socialist case out into the ranks of the working class, particularly now as capitalism’s rottenness becomes more exposed to the public gaze. First, it is necessary to understand that case, and a start can be made by discarding the romantic nonsense of the barricades. Those who most loudly proclaim their hatred of the bourgeoisie show it in a strange way by aping it.

We do not see the ballot as a cure-all ; it is majority understanding of Socialism which counts most. How will we know when we are a majority? there may be better methods of finding this out, but, meantime we still think that the ballot is the best way of finding out what people are thinking at any particular time.

Vic Vanni

Canada to grow no wheat in 1970 (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

Canada is planning to follow America in its notorious policy of paying farmers not to grow wheat.

Last year the world produced more of this essential foodstuff than could be sold profitably. There was what is often misleadingly called a wheat "glut” or "surplus”.

There had been a bumper harvest in 1968 too so that the already huge stocks of wheat were piled up even higher. In Australia there was talk of leaving some of the wheat to rot unharvested on the farms. The International Grains Agreement, under which the five major wheat-exporting countries fix prices and carve up the world market, was threatened as its members tried to sell their wheat below the agreed prices.

Representatives of these five countries— America, Canada, France, Australia and Argentina — met in London last August and agreed that in 1970 there should be a cut-back in world wheat production. The new Canadian policy is part of this bargain, a restrictive practice forced on its government by the economics of production for sale.

The Canadian prairies are particularly suited to growing wheat and in a rationally-organised world (one based on common ownership and production solely for use) could make a major contribution towards abolishing hunger. Even now the 1,300m. bushels of wheat lying unused, some of it going to rot, in warehouses and on farms throughout Canada amounts to nearly three years’ consumption.

Under capitalism such potential abundance presents a problem, since if profits are to be made output must be restricted. The man in charge of Canada’s wheat sales. Minister without Portfolio Otto Lang, has suggested that no wheat should be grown in Canada for at least one year. He told the Canadian House of Commons in Ottawa on 27 February how the government planned to tackle this "problem” of potential plenty.

They would spend $100m. on paying farmers to take up to 22m. acres out of wheat production in 1970. Since in 1969 only 24.4m. acres were used for wheat-growing, a reduction of 22m. would mean that in 1970 practically no wheat would be grown in Canada. Lang confirmed that this was the government’s aim and estimated a drop in wheat production of 500m. bushels in 1970.

His whole speech is an amazing indictment of capitalism (see Canadian House of Commons Debates, Vol. 114. No. 76, Friday, February 27, 1970). “Mr. Speaker”, he began

the carryover of wheat in Canada will be approximately 950 million bushels on July 31 of this year, equivalent to nearly two years’ disappearance. To reach a stock position in reasonable relationship to normal sales volumes, production of wheat must be reduced substantially below sales levels.

If the government did nothing, he went on, wheat farmers would switch to growing other grains. This was undesirable:

In large measure, this would lead to to increased acreage in other crops. Our stock positions particularly in oats and barley, arc already high. A further increase in acreage in these crops this year would result in burdensome surplus and lower prices for these products.

Since the farmers had to be prevented from growing barley and oats as well as wheat, the government had no choice.

The government proposes to implement a programme to reduce wheat acreage and to encourage farmers in the Wheat Board designated region to hold this land out of production of any crop this year.

Farmers will be paid $6 for every acre they turn over to growing “forage crops” (that is, grass) and $10 for every acre they take out of production altogether (this higher payment will be restricted to 2m. acres in order to avoid the danger of a dustbowl). The whole programme is supposed to be a temporary measure to clear existing stocks and the Minister predicted that in time “Canada will be able to return to a level of production in the area of 20 million acres”. But he went on to warn:

Additional measures will be required in 1971 to assure that production does not exceed acceptable levels.

He means “profitable levels” of course.

So Canada is to pay its farmers $100m. not to grow 500m. bushels of wheat in 1970. Remember that the next time someone tries to tell you that world poverty is caused by over-population. Tell him it’s caused by the underproduction that goes with capitalism’s profit motive.

Socialist activity in New Zealand (1970)

From the May 1970 issue of the Socialist Standard

Auckland Branch of the Socialist Party of New Zealand are active selling the Socialist Standard and distributing leaflets as well as holding regular Sunday afternoon meetings in the local Albert Park. Some of these meetings have been disrupted by members of the Progressive Youth Movement, a Maoist group which gained some publicity recently be threatening to stage anti-royalist incidents during the recent visit of Mrs. Elizabeth Wettin. Somewhat inconsistently the PYM complain of police brutality while at the same time using physical force to try to prevent the Socialist case, including criticism of state capitalist China from being heard.

A comrade from the Socialist Party of Great Britain, visiting Auckland on a ship, was interviewed on NZTV about outdoor speaking during which we managed to explain that the world socialist movement stood for the abolition of the wages system and production for use with free access.

Finally, we regret to report the death of our comrade Tom Jackson at the age of 80. Tom Jackson joined the NZ Marxian Association in 1918 when he was working as a miner of the west coast of South Island. He later joined the SPNZ after it was formed in the 1930s and remained a staunch Socialist devoting his efforts, as comrades put it, "to help hasten the abolition of the profit system and establish a system fit for human beings".