A delegated meeting on October 22 brought 300 men and women together to plan a national campaign on equal rights for women, with the demands of equal pay, equal training, equal opportunity in the forefront. Among organisations represented were AEF, NUVB, Furniture Trades Operatives, Shopworkers, TGWU, DATA, ASTMS, POEU, CAWU, Taylors and Garment Workers, National Union of Agricultural and Allied Workers, various trades councils, Mothers in Action, National Assembly of Women, International Marxist Group, and the Communist Party.
A programme of militant action was developed, an October 27-type demonstration in Trafalgar Square, lapel badges, a national conference, local meetings and conferences, pickets of union negotiating meetings, lobbies of parliament, local demonstrations,
A voluntary general committee of 40 from this meeting met on November 11, elected an executive and a working sub-committee. Among the executive members are Baroness Summerskill, Honorary President; Chris Norwood, MP, co-chairman with Audrey Hunt, ASTMS and Women's Advisory Committee of the TUC; and FP, Blake, NUVB, secretary-treasurer.
A lively discussion on limiting the aims of the campaign to equal pay and related demands took place, but it was the overwhelming sentiment that the campaign should encompass all the demands necessary to achieve equal rights for all women not just women who are presently in industry.
This campaign with its declared aim of achieving equal pay within 12 months; its militant outlook; its non-sectarianism; its extra-parliamentary construction, is bound to come up sharply against the state. Already proponents of the demands have denounced Barbara Castle and the Government's gradualist programme for achieving equal pay, and the implications of such demands for the incomes policy are obvious.
The potential of this campaign for radicalising and mobilising thousands of men and women is only limited by the attitude of socialists and militant trade unionists towards it. The liberation of the working class will only be brought about by its willingness to fight for the rights of its component parts and the ability of the conscious vanguard to lead and deepen the struggle.
People interested in setting up local branches of the campaign should contact: NATIONAL JOINT ACTION CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE for EQUAL RIGHTS, c/o P. Blake (secretary), 76, Rainham Rd., Rainham, Essex.
Toni Gorton