[illegible — opening passage on scan page 11 is heavily degraded] it is necessary to place the examination of the document in the correct context by sketching quickly some of the rapid technical and economic [illegible] taking place in Britain's economy, [illegible] the historical process [illegible]. Following this we can then examine some of the militant response by the [illegible] unions and project what [illegible] the kinds of actions required by the working class to meet the offensive of the Labour Government. [illegible] British capitalism has undergone and is undergoing [illegible].
[illegible] increasing the monopolisation [illegible] Britain. [illegible] crisis for British capitalism may be summed up in the devaluation of the pound, [illegible] the Labour Government's White Paper "In Place of Strife" [illegible] between unions and the employers. The White Paper is an astonishing document because of its blatant and hostile anti-trade union character. The document bends over [illegible] to bring [illegible] government intervention in industrial relations (to try to rationalise its role in regard to trade unions): [illegible] the document makes no differentiation between the Labour administration and the Tory and Liberal administrations, during which the unions [illegible] to fight for recognition. One of the [illegible]
agent is the continual advice given to employers on how to control the unions. [illegible] the SUNDAY TELEGRAPH of April 13, for example, the following statement appeared: "The Confederation of British Industry [illegible] grave reservations about the effectiveness [illegible] the proposals in Mrs Barbara Castle's White Paper in Place of Strife", which will be the [illegible] legislation. Many employers would [illegible] see legislation to make industrial agreements legally enforceable."
In section 443 of the White Paper [illegible] reply this is given: "This would not only be ineffectual; it would prove a deterrent. As the Donovan Report [illegible] points out, few collective agreements, including procedure agreements, are today in a form suitable for legal enforcement; the vast majority would be [illegible] in law [illegible] uncertainty. The most [illegible] is to press ahead with the reform of [illegible] procedure agreements, but unions are not likely to [illegible] with enthusiasm in this if they feel [illegible] it is merely a first step to coerce them into commitments they do not want. It is for [illegible] that legal enforcement [illegible]."
Thus it is true to say that the Labour Government [illegible] many employers have a TACTICAL difference over legally enforced agreements. But this disagreement lies only in estimating the right time and place for implementing legal collective agreement procedures into industrial relations. There are many examples throughout history of [illegible] trying to demonstrate how indispensable [illegible] for administration [illegible] the system for the capitalist class.
The White Paper is oriented in such a way that [illegible] certain [illegible] are [illegible] towards the trade union bureaucrats. [illegible] include: protection against unfair dismissals, assistance in obtaining trade union recognition, establishment of the right to join unions and wider provision of adult training.
But the essential [illegible] in Barbara Castle's White Paper of reducing [illegible] power of the rank and file workers on the shop floor comes through very clearly [illegible] the part of the document which is addressed towards the bureaucrats in the trade unions. In fact, the document stresses very strongly the necessity for trade union leadership to strengthen [illegible] in order that it can [illegible].
The parts of the document which are causing great alarm throughout the [illegible] unions are as follows: ballots for official disputes, [illegible] periods, [illegible] penalties etc. As you can see by a quick glance at these legislative measures, if implemented they would in large [illegible] take from unions the right to strike, [illegible] their leaders or those [illegible] the [illegible].
We will now take a closer look at those sections of the document which are leading towards a massive [illegible] between the unions and the Labour Government.
LEGALLY IMPOSED BALLOTS FOR OFFICIAL DISPUTES
This measure is designed to take away from the worker the control he has won over working conditions at the point of production. The concessions he has achieved against speed-ups, improvements in bonus payments and by way of safety have to a large degree been won, if not by withdrawing his labour then by threatening to withdraw his labour.
The Ford strike brought home very clearly the undemocratic nature of the national negotiating union committees and likewise the mobilisation of the shop floor workers pointed the way for more direct representation from rank and file. The democratisation of the unions is an affair of the workers and they must reject any interference by [illegible] Government which is spearheading an anti-trade union offensive.
There used to be a saying in the trade union movement in the United States: that letting a Government into a union to supervise its affairs is like letting a fox into a hen house to supervise the running of the hens.
CONCILIATION PAUSES (COOLING OFF PERIODS)
This is a very dangerous piece of legislation. A Government injunction would be served on a group of workers in the middle of a strike, ordering them back to work for twenty-eight days. The pretext for this action is outlined under the sub-title "Strikes and the National Interest". It reads: "Britain's special problems in industrial relations arise not from official strikes and lock-outs, but from sudden industrial action taken before adequate negotiation or discussion of the problems have taken place. Such strikes can cause serious damage, not only to other employers in the same firm but to employees elsewhere and, above all, to the country's economic development."
The White Paper is oriented in such a way that [illegible] to convince unions [illegible] in their own interests. [illegible] the importance of fighting this pernicious piece of legislation. We in the Post Office Engineers Union are being threatened daily by [illegible] offensive against our wage standards and work conditions by the Post Office management and [illegible] Labour Government. The militants are trying to work towards taking some effective action such as strike action. But if we succeed the first reaction will be: "it's against the public interest". This is the thin edge of the wedge: the first step will be to clamp down on the workers in Government services; this, no doubt, will be followed by action against workers in the [illegible] industry vital for exports.
LEGAL PENALTIES
We will first take a look at legal penalties then we will examine some of the reactions by the trade unions. If the proposals embodied in the White Paper become law then in certain circumstances in which there is a Department of Employment and Productivity order for a return to work [illegible] the continuation of the strike will render the [illegible] strikers [illegible] their leaders or those [illegible] the strike (the White Paper does not make this clear) liable to financial penalties. These would be imposed by the industrial board. The collection of the fines would be dealt with through the court by "attachment of earnings and other civil remedies for the collection of debts."
The Labour Government claims that trade unionists will not have to go to [illegible]. But [illegible] follows from [illegible] attachment of earnings, the [illegible] standard questionnaire [illegible] will compel a debtor to disclose his means and circumstances [illegible] taken [illegible] to attend [illegible] for example [illegible] this will be deemed contempt of court and the [illegible], therefore, be liable to be committed to gaol.
The first battle over penalty clauses was fought [illegible] opposition by the trade unions to this legislation [illegible] tends to cut out the role of the bureaucrat as [illegible] intermediate between the bosses and workers [illegible].
[illegible] the point that must be stressed is the necessity for the unions [illegible] the offensive [illegible] role of Scanlon and Jones we must recognise [illegible] revolutionary [illegible] working class and not [illegible] property of the mass of the workers. [illegible] system of production and finance by the working class.
[illegible] I would like to make [illegible] a quote from Leon Trotsky's [illegible] "[illegible] Epoch of [illegible] Decay": "There is one common feature in the development, or more correctly the degeneration of [illegible] trade union organisations in the entire world: [illegible] their drawing closely to and growing together with the state powers [illegible] this process is equally [illegible]. [illegible] trade unions of our time can either serve as secondary instruments [illegible] imperialist capitalism [illegible] the [illegible] and disciplining of workers [illegible] the revolution [illegible], or contrary [illegible] can become the instruments of the revolutionary movement of the proletariat."
At the annual conference of the Scottish TUC [illegible] a similar position prevailed [illegible]. One of the most devastating comments by a trade union leader is that by Allan Sapper, deputy secretary of the Association of Cinematograph, Television and Allied Technicians, who said that the Government is trying to do [illegible] in Germany [illegible] and unionism [illegible] Hitler and Mussolini [illegible]: Government by decree [illegible].
[illegible — remaining branch-report and labour-news passages on scan pages 12-13, including the Nottingham and Swansea reports, are heavily degraded and only partly legible]