As yet, no national trade union official has offered a systematic socialist critique of the recent Royal Commission on Trade Unions. For instance, just as Clive Jenkins is sympathetic about Jim Mortimer joining the Prices and Incomes Board, so too he makes no fundamental criticism of the Royal Commission. Mr. Jenkins' recent article on the Commission in the NEWS OF THE WORLD was a very approving one. It is clear from their comments that such trade union officials as Woodcock and Cousins view the Commission's Report with, at best, narrow trade unionist consciousness. There seems to be a feeling of relief in the trade union establishment that the Commission has come out against the legal enforcement of industrial agreements. Such feelings are misplaced. It is surely obvious that it has become quite unnecessary for the Commission to advocate such legislation when the Prices and Incomes Act already covers this crucial area.
UNOFFICIAL STRIKES
The Commission is worried about unofficial strikes, even though it has to admit that by European standards the figures are quite low in Britain. The Commission's concern clearly reflects the present precarious state of the capitalist system - after all, it seems that a strike by a couple hundred women workers for a few days at Fords can put the capitalist system into chaos and cause panic among the Labour Cabinet. (The ministers certainly do their best to defend the right of Fords NOT to pay 5d. an hour increase to the £12 a week women.)
It is in this kind of atmosphere that the Commission recommends the setting up of an Industrial Relations Commission which would have powers to investigate problems in an individual factory or a whole industry and supervise the registration of agreements. In a recent article in THE TIMES, one of the Commission members, Mr. Eric [illegible] made clear the Commission's underlying philosophy - "we are all agreed on the basic analysis of Britain's industrial relations troubles. We all think that labour relations in the workshops in many industries are out of control and that this is a main cause of unofficial strikes, restrictive practices, chaotic wage structures and unbalanced growth of earnings." The conclusions from all this is obvious; the shop floor workers, and in particular the shop stewards, must be put more firmly under "official" control by the joint apparatus of trade union hierarchy, employers prerogatives and where necessary, state power. (This is yet a further development of the corporate state, almost as obvious as the recent fraternal gathering of the C.B.I., Harold Wilson, the Queen and other members of the royal family, Edward Heath, George Woodcock and Co., which took place at the London Guildhall in celebration of the T.U.C.'s centenary.)
PENALISING UNOFFICIAL STRIKE LEADERS
One of the Commission's proposals is particularly vicious. This is the proposal to remove from unofficial strike leaders immunity from legal action. This proposal would be made to operate by bringing more rules about the breach of contract act. (This recommendation was carried by 7 to 5.) Lord Robens, a member of the Commission, went even further by suggesting that all unofficial strikers should lose entitlement to redundancy pay. Among the Commission's suggestions which aim to sweeten the pill is one which urges all employers to recognise trade unions in their plants. (Perhaps the workers' struggles at Roberts Arundel for such recognition makes the Commission's pontifications on this point a little unnecessary.)
So it is the shop floor workers, the militants and especially [illegible] who are the Commission's target. Clearly our job as socialists is to defend the shop stewards and at the same time to extend workers' rights [illegible].
(Royal Commission on Trade Unions and Employers' Associations 1965-68, £2 from H.M.S.O.)