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THE MARKET AND THE MULTINATIONALS JAN 1973 APRIL 1975 THE MARKET IS THE SO LETS JOIN'EM!
MAGNA CARTA FOR THE BARONS CE THEI MULTINATIONALS!
THE FIGHT LABOUR CAN'T LEAD
Nº2 in the series SCOTLAND, LABOUR & WORKERS POWER BY IMG SCOTLAND 15P INTERNATIONAL MARXIST GROUP
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1. INTRODUCTION
When Alex Ferry, AUEW Glasgow District Organiser, spoke at ‘Tribune's’ anti-Common Market rally in Glasgow, he listed six working class organisations opposed to entry into the Market: the TUC, the STUC, the Co-op party, the Scottish Labour Party, and - because the terms it laid down for entry were not met - the Labour Party. It was, as he pointed out, a solid fronmtof working class opposition tothe Market, Where has this solid front been broken most openiv? Where has the greatest throat to working class unity against the Market come from?
The breach occurred in full public view when Harold Wilson (who in January 1973 described the Market as the ‘Magna Carta for the barons of the multinationals’) , forced through a House of Commons vote for the Common Market against a majority of his own MPs, using Tory and Liberal votes.
Where did the second blow to the unity of the working class anti-market forces occur? It happened at the same debate when, of the thirty-one ministers opposed to the Market, one - Eric Hoffer « spoke out against the Market in the Government debate. His action made it clear what had happened in the parliamentary party -that despitea majority of MPs being opposed Lo the market, the ‘lelts’ had accepled a gag imposed by Wilson, and had put up Helfer asa sacrificial lamb to cover for their refusal to mobilise opposition.
With a clear mandate from the labour movement to organise an open fight against the market, using all the forces of that movement, they balked at the first hurdle, The Common Murket is the Magna Carta for the barons of the multinationals - and far more. Thal is why itis a vital necessity for the whole workers’ movement lo unite against it and the power behind it - the power of the capitalist class. ltis also vital for the Labour Movement not only to unite against the Market and for the most massive ’No' in the referendum, but to organise the fight against the backers of the market, against the multinationals - and to pursue the struggle for an alternative - a socialist alternative - to the Market.
That is why in Scotland, where the Labour Party has declared its united opposition to the Market, these events have iu special significance. And the reasons for this Opposition are not hard to find. Scotland has suffered more from the drain of industry to the heart of the European Economic Community, and more from the depradations of the multinationals, ihan and other part of Britain. And the discovery which, if exploited in a planned way, could bring the greatest promise of change - North Sea Oilhas resulted instead in the greatest explosion of unstable multinational investment yet seen, It has also given rise to a situation unparalleled in the rest of Britain, in which the major capitalist party - the SNP - has opposed the market.
The importance of this fact is that the SNP, far [rom swelling the ranks of those fighting the multinationals is, as we shall show, preparing a backdoor deal with the Oil monopolies and their financiers to strengthen the multinationals.
This gives the Anti-Common Market campaign in Scotland a particular duty to examine and understand clearly the nature of the market, its origins, the alternatives, and the way in which the fight against it must be conducted.
It is for this reason that this pamphlet has been produced, in conjunction with a British IMG pamphlet which takes up the broader issues of the campaign in the rest of Britain. Its purpose is to deal with the particular duties and tasks facing Scottish workers in relation to the EEC. For this reason it concentrates centrally on three aspects of,he problem: Regional policy and the multinationals inScotland; NorthSea Oil and the rise of the SNP; and the policy and strategy of the Labour Lefton the EEC.
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2. WHOSE DEMOCRACY?
Wilson carried out his sordid manouvre in parliament for a very sunple reason, [tis because the interests he serves when in government are not those of his party or his electors. He serves Lhe interesis of the big capitalists and multinationals which the Labour Government bas opted to prop up: the 154 firms who are backing the ‘Britain in Europe’ campaign. The vote shows very clearly who rules parliament. The politics of the “Social Contract’ and the atlempt to keep these firms going with state gifts and every conceivable form of concession has meant that. when the crunch came, Wilson had no alternative but to push through the pro-market vote. If he had mobilised the working class against the market, then he would also have bad to mobilise that same working class against the multinationals and bankers.
But the antics of the Labour ‘lefts’ are even more revealing. They are designed to achieve the biggest possible verbal opposition lo the market - without currying through the break with Wilson to the extent of mobilising the party machine against the market. This is why, for example, the Labour Party NEC took the decision to permit individual labour party organisations do their own thing in the Common Market campaign. How many times has the left. taking their mandate [rom the working class, been hammered into line by the party machine for disloyalty? Yet the NEC, against the overwhelming majority of the Labour movement, gives the green light for the right wing to split the campaign. The parliamentary tailis wagging the working class dog!
Unfortunately, this throws into a rather clear and not very comfortable light Alex Ferry's opening remarks at the Tribune meeting. He said: ‘We are opposed to the Common Market in the first place because it threatens the foundations of our democratic system and the sovereignty of our people’.
But at the very start of the campaign, the reality of our ‘democratic system’ has been laid bare by the very way in which the campaign is conducted! Here we have the working class, through its organisations - the Trades Unions and the Labour Party | overwhelmingly opposed to the Common Market. We have a massive, two pronged campaign by the bosses to keep Britain in, using resources the workers movement could not hope to command, They pour millions of pounds into a massive propaganda campaign, tilled with lies and hysteria. And at the same time these gentlemen, who know very well how lo use parliament against the working class and against its party when in power, manage w splitthe united working class opposition to the markel down the middle, using parliament to do so.
What has happened to the real democracy which matters to the working chiss - its democratic control over its own organisations? The fact is that parliament hus shown once again that when it comes to the crunch for the capitalists, itis used against workers’ democracy, as a weapon to split and divide the Labour Movement.
And the reason is very plain. When Benn told his Scottish audience that devolution would be of no use if power still lay outside both the Assembly and Parliament, in Brussels, he got just one thing - one very important thing - wrong. Power does lie outside parliament, Power will lic outside the Assembly. Power lies in the hands of the capitalisis, Parliament, created by the original Magna Carta, is the captive of the capitalist system, of the big monopolies and of the private enterprise system itself.
What the Treaty of Rome doesis strengthen the barof the cage. Itlaysdown in black and white what has always been unwritten, when it says for example (Article 92) that “Government aid which distorts competition shall be incompatible with the aims of the Market’ Benn is quite right when he says that what this actually means is ‘Government action which threatens private enterprise shuil be incompatible with the aims of the Market’. The point is very simply: when has any government been permitted such action by the capitalist class? The answeris: never. The Marketis just one means they use to enforce the real power - their power.
Representatives of the workers’ movement in parliament can only serve the interests of that class if they understand they are ina prison. Their job is always to act as the servant of the class and not the jailers - and to mobilise the class against the
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system and the jailers: because the only power strong enough to defeat the power of the capitalists is the power of the workers’ movement.
This is exactly what the Labour ‘lefts’ have not done, They, along with Wilson, have shown themselves still to be prisoners of the parliamentary system.
Uniortunately, this does not only jeopardise the campaign aguinst the market, It also confuses and jeopardises the fightagainst the pwoer behind the Market itself. The real enemy is well known toScottish workers. Nameslike Singer, Plessey, Honeywell, Timex, ITT. Hoovers are household names, Every one of them has been fighting major battles over pay and conditions, or have been launching layoffs and short-time working. The only weapon for dealing with them is direct action and international workers’ solidarity.
Nothing could show more clearly than the opening stages of the campaign itself that not only can the ‘left’ notorganise a united campaign against the market, but that they do not recognise the measures necessary to conduct the real fight: against the multinationals. [t is vital that the other forces in the campaign therclore take up and explain to the working class, the real issues involved and the real alternatives to the market, instead of splitting and confusing the movement with parliamentary humbug, And the real alternatives are socialist planning, and effective workers action fo impose tt, The problem is that the Labour Party lefts’ failure to organise the campaign elfectively is. a consequence of the fact that whilst critical of Labour Party policy, they have not understood the fundamental reason for its failure. That is why the policies they are defending and advocating, as well as the way they conduct the campaign, do nol provide a vinble strategy for the workers’ movement. It follows from the same reasoning which has led them to welcome right wing Tories and fascists into the campaign in England - a strategy the IMG has fought and will continue to fight very vigorously, [tis because they do not see that the key to success in the fight against all aspects of what the capitalists do is the mobilisation of the working class as a united and independent force, This means that any tactics which break up that unity or that independence - like incorporating the deadly enemies of the workers’ movement in action against those enemies, or bowing down to Wilson whn he defends the interests of the ruling class lead in the direction of failure. And it means that policies which rely on parliament, instead of on the strength of the workers’ movement, can always be sabotaged by the capitalist system. and will also lead in the direction of fialure.
Nowhere could this be clearer than in relation to the issues of most special concern to Scottish workers:
* The continued underdevelopment of the Scottish economy and the resulting poverty of the Scottish working people. * The exploitation of North Sea Oil. + The issue of Independence, the issue of devolution, and the rise of the Scottish National Party. [tis these issues which must now be explored.
3. THE OLL CONNECTION Scottish workers have been caught in a crossfire between America, Europe, andthe mitidie Fast. Foreign and multinational control and ownership of industry in Scotland is far higher than in the rest of Britain, and still rising: and yet a whole section of the
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capitalist class in Scotland is seeking an alternative outside the market. This sectionis spearheaded by the Scettish National Party, which launched its own campaign. against the market in Edinburgh this March.
The SNP has replaced the Tory party as the main ruling class party in Scotland, It has the backing of many of the major figures in Scottish banking and finance, and a large number of industrialists. Names such as Sir Hugh Fraser, Sir William Lithgow, and Lord Clydesmuir, in supporting the SNP, have given it far more than respectability.
They have put the backing of Scotland's main capitalists squarely behind the nationalists, and they have lined up the important finance companies involved in Oil - Noble Grossart, Edward Bates. the Scottish banks, They have made (he Oil connection for the SNP. This connection has enabled it to grow in capitalist circles to the extent where SNP leaders like William Wolle tour North America and speak with Kissinger and Kennedy, and where the Arab states in OPEC (Organisation of Petroleum exporting companies) demand that the SNP be represented at OPEC meetings with equal status to the governments of other countries!
The SNP has opposed the EEC at the same time as it paints a sham picture of an independent Scotland, using North Sea Oil to bargain with the world. More dangerous still, a whole section of the Labour Party in Scotland - the devolutionists - have been using very similar arguments.
In our previous pamphlet, ‘Scotland, Labour and Workers’ Power’ 'we showed how false this was and how it confuses and disotients the working class on one hand, and carries out the dirty work of the oil monopolies on the other.
But the most illuminating insight on what the SNP is up to is provided by the way in which it has changed its position on the market, andthe way in which ithas completely dithered around in its public positions on whether or nol an independent Scotland would be part of the market - in effect, on whether it is opposed Lo the market itself, or to the role which Scottish capitalists were being assigned within it.
Three years ago, its position was ‘No voice, No vote’. which meant that it was not opposed to the Common Market, but would campaign against Britain going in because Scotland could not decide for itself whether or not it wanted to go in.
But this was before the SNP's links with the International Oi] Monopolies were consolidated. These same Oil monopolies are now accused in the United States of defrauding customers of over $,000,000,000 dollars by keeping prices artificially high during the ‘energy crisis’, The same Oil monopolies recently mounted a huge and very successful campaign around the Labour Government's proposals to tax them, threatening to withdraw investment and employment [rom Scotland unless they were allowed to continue to make their superprofits. The same Oil monopolies decide for themselves where to invest these profits, not on the basis of social need, and not under the control of any government or party, but according to the dictates of profit.
The SNP has now changed its position because it has cast its lot with Lhe monopolies and their backers. Unlike the rest of the capitalist class in Britain, it is not after effective competition with American capital through protection against it, but after collaboration with it. Infact, asis shown by the case of Edward Bates the new whizzkid merchant bankers, some are going even further. Bates’ chairman, in his last annual Tepert, announced that profits were down on the previous year, The reason for this, he said, was that investment prospects in Scotland were not adequate. There was no room for expansion for all the capital they had ammassed, They were therefore going to invest it in .... America! !
This follows an all too familiar pattern, The problem for the Scottish economy has never been the amount of capital owned or controlled by or through Scottish bodies. Scotland has a very strong banking sector, very strong and growing merchant banks, and soon. But the money is not invested in Scotland, because there is no viable basis for it to make profits, These evelts are very important to Scottish workers. Firstly, they give the lie tothe myth which is put about by both the SNP and the Labour Party devolutionists, thatitis
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possible through the Oil bonanza to make an island of prosperity inasea of economic doom, and that all Scotland need do is cut itself off from the millstone of the British economy. They show thatthe basic cause of economic instability remains the same for Seotland as for Britain and in fact all capitalist countries, and is no less avoidable in Scotland.
The cause is that, on the one hand the world economic recession and the strength of the organised workers’ movement is eating into profits; and on the other, capitalists cannot find away out of their impasses without expanding their sphere of investment. The backers of the SNP are nol interested in prosperity for the Scottish working class, and areeven linding it hard to generate investment in Scotland for Scottish capitalists. Their job is to pass on the capital generated or sent into Scotland and invest it where it will make the most profit. They are the ‘fences’ for the superprofits of the oil monopolies, and the fuct thatthey livein Scotland in no way means they will store their foods there.
4.THE MARKET AND THE MULTINATIONALS These events demonstrate also the real nature of the threat posed by the EEC. Itis not, as Benn would have us believe, the threat to British ‘Sovereignty’. [t lies in the fact that the big firms, the big industries, the big monopolies that dominate the lives of most workers have become international. The threat to the working class comes from the fact that these companies want to use institutions like the EEC to strengthen themselves, Now, of course, European capitalists want to strengthen themselves against American capitalists, and vice versa, But they both have a lar bigger, eurnmon interest: that is to strengthen themselves against the working class.
The Treaty of Rome gives the multinationals the freedom to operate on a European seale. What does this freedom mean? It means the freedom to shut down plant in one country and open it up in another because the workforce is less stroppy, because the workers have forced less concessions [rom their government, or because the market is better, It means the freedom to force migrant workers to travel the length and breadth of Europe following work - just as Scottish workers have been forced to follow the oil jobs - denying them the most elementary democratic rights, denying them trade union rights, and using the poison of racism to set them againsteach other andso weaken and divide the working class, Il means short-time working, mass redundancies at the whim ol a managing director. And it means the steady erosion of the organisation and trade union rights that workers have built up through years of struggle to defend themselves against such attacks.
But the Treaty of Home secks to go much further than just operating as a [ree trade area, IL aims at a ‘single. unified European state’, Such a strategy is. of course, even more dangerous than what is already in existence. Such a state would deliver up enormous financial, military and legislative powers inte the hands of the multinationals, But what does the SNP's strategy mean? [1 means the strengthening of the multinationals by a different read. They gave the game away when they were interviewed hey the Scotsman itor the April ‘Chl Register’. They suid, in answer toa question on whal they saw 45 the relation between Oil wml Europe, that Scotland should use its oil resources ie obtain special trading agreements with the REC & with the EFTA countries. Oil would be the main bargaining counter in these negotiations.
But what does using oil to gel special trading agreements actually mean? liimeans that the Oil companies will use Scotland to get the trading ugreemenis they want wiilingly assisted by the multinationals with branches in Seotlind.11 means hat the only way to control the exploitation of oil for social need is completely shirked - using the workers’ movement to fight them and to determine real secial need, and carrying through the full nationalisation of all oil-relued industry under workers control asa first step to the completely planned exphiitation of energy resources in the interests of working peaple and their families.
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The devolutionists make exactly the same mistake when they back the Labour Left's policy of “special trading agreements’ as the alternative tu Lhe market, accompanied by import and exchange control, [mport and exchange control have been shown by practice and common sense to be abselutely inudequate protection against the multinationals and against the anarchy of the world market, Nothing short of a state monopoly of foreign trade, organising and supervising via the worker movement all movement of goods, is capable of introducing the degree af control necessary for sociolist planning, This mistake is made precisely because the ‘lefts’ und the SNP assert that parliamentary institutions, be they the British parliament or the Scovtish Assembly, can possess the power to deal with capitalism, But the SNPS FIGHT AGAINST THE MONOPOLIES IS 4 SHAM FIGHT. It is ludicrous for a party which has been sitting at the table ol the biggest crooks in the business to say it is engaged in fighting them. They may be betting against the other players, but they are still in the game. The SNP wants to use the Assembly asa bargaining counter. The assembly isan ideal body for such a sham fight, because itis a sham boxy.
But when the devolutionisis want to take the working cliss into a sham body with blinkers on, and tell them it has real power, then this adifferent matter: because they will deliver the working class gagged and bound into the waiting arms of the oil companies.
Nothing reveals the sham character of the proposed Assembly, and the weakness of the alternatives to the market proposed by the ‘left’, than the fate of the policies which have already been used, and which the Labour leit and the TUC so curnestly back against the EEC - its regional policy, §. SCOTLAND - THE BRANCH ECONOMY William Wolle, speaking at the March SNP rally against the market in Edinburgh, told his audience that the party were discussing replacing the main slogan of ‘It's a Scotland's (Hl, with a new slogan - ‘Scotland International’.
The SNP have a fine sense of irony. Scotland's industry has never been more international). Kut Scotland’s workers have never been farther [rom owning or controlling the oil, or any other part of Scotland's resources.
In his article*in ‘The Red Paper on Scotland’, the economist John Firn points out that 59 percent of all Scottish workers are employed by firms whose ultimate ownership resides outside Scotland. 64 percent of plants employing more than 1000 and less than 5000 workers, and eleven out ofthe fourteen planta employing more than 5000, are in the same ‘situation, Furthermore, the extent of foreign investment is growing rapidly, and grew most rapidly during the period of the Wilson Government of 1964-1970, when Labour's regional policy was in full swing. The following figures show American investment in manufacturing in Scotland between 1964 and 1968: Category 1964 ist6 1963 Output © 165m e 247m £ 366m Qutput per worker £ 9200 & 4000 £ S000 Exporis £ tm ge itm # 14m Investment £ 106m & 162m £ 232m Employment 52,000 61.000) 73,000 (Source: Scottish Council (Development and Industry), Scottish Economic Review, September 1968)
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What did this mean’? Ina situation where the number of mines dropped fram 166 L047, and the number of miners from 83 thousand to 99 thousand between 1958 and 1968; where the number of yards on the Clyde fell from 17 to 3 with the loss of 15,000 jobs in the same period, regional policy had the effect, not only of accelerating this decline in traditional industry, but also in replacing it with @ lesser umount of unstable, multinational industry.4 And this investment hos done nothing to change the basic realities ol Scottish Poverty, Nearly a quarter of Scotland's population are living in poverty or just above the poverty line. Unemployment continues permenently above Southern lveels, above all in the black spots of Clydeside and Tayside. And more ominous still, the new employment resulting from oil-related industry does not extend significantly beyond the construction of Tigs and pipelines - which tails aff in 4-6 years, The T&GW newspaper ‘Highway’ estimates that 54,000 new jobs will be created from Oil - not far over half the present unemployment rate.
The TUC staterment on why the EEC should be opposed gives as one ol the principal reasons the defence of regional policy. The most damning indictment of this delence remains the report we quoted in ‘Scotland, Labour and Workers’ Power’ * “The report points to the failure of British regional poliey despite the fact that in the last decade Scotland received an average more than 30% of all expenditure under the Local Employment legislation, around 35-40% of regional employment premium, and nearly 40% of the limited expenditure under the 1972 Industry Act. “The report states: ‘yet unemployment continues unabated .... as though regional policy had never existed” (Taken from the Glasgow Herald of 12 August 1974).
The reasons for this fact have to be sought in the processes which gave rise to the Common Market itself - the processes which determine the investment of the multinationals.
6. INVESTMENT AND THE MULTINATIONALS There is no shortage of money for investment in Scotland. Per capita holding ot equities in Seotland is twice as high as in England. Scottish banks held deposits totalling 114 thousand million pounds. Scottish Insurance companies hold elghteen hundred million pounds -aneigth of all British insurance company funds. And Scottish investment Lrusts account for one third of all British investment trusts. 4 The problem for Scotland, therefore, is not one of generating or owning capital, and in this sense Scotland is not a classical colony or underdeveloped country, The probiem lies in persuading its owners to invest it in Scotland. For in fact, Scotland's high ownership of investment capital is equalled only by the enthusiasm with which it is Invested abroad.
Capitalists invest where they can be sure of getting the greatest return on their investment. A series of facters enter into their decision, the most important being the case and cost of obtaining labour of the kind they need, the cost of obtaining materials, und access to markets.
Scotland has been unable to attract balanced investment because capital investment has concentrated in the growth regions of the Common Market, in the new postwar prowth industries - petrochemicals, electronics, elc. This concentration creates skilled Labour forces, markets and other conditions favourable to investment, increasing the tendency for investment to flow away from underdeveloped or
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declining regions like Scotland and into the richer areas like the South East of Engiand. These tendencies are now so inbuilt and insurmountable that the South East is now the only area not receiving some kind of CONCESSION OF incentive, But the effects of tax concessions or regional incentives is not to build up a new, stable industry ina planned way. It attracts three types of investers. The Tirst is the fly-by-night invester who wants Lo make a quick killing. The second is the sweatshop merchant using local cheap labour. And the third, and most important, is the multinational corporation.
The tultinationals are big enough tosell and produce in several countries. They are big enough to organise a division of labour on un internilional scale, They are big enough to place a branch factory ina declining region such as Scotla nd, pick wp tie tax concessions and take advantage of the cheaper labour force, and transport the product to where it is sold or assembled.
But as soon as the labour force fets too expensive, or the market goes down, or the tax concessions are threatened - down come the screws.
Thus. in two successive, protracted strikes, ITT virtually shut down their sft factory in East Kilbride to get rid of the militants. Every time a new pay claim threatens Chrysler, the American managers are roped in to make it clear the factory will close if the trouble goes on. The power which Chryslor pussess is shown by the fact that before they would come to Scotland, they fol a special agreement guaranteeing them a percentage of exports.
Factory alter factory has been shutting down, laying off, or putting workers on short time because of declining world markets, [t means that Scottish branch factories become pawns in the gume as the multinationals adjust to these fluctuations tokeep their profits up and cut their losses.
The working class gets both ends of the stick. The firms in Scotland are bigser and tougher than their predecessors. So it is harder io get better conditions and harder to organise effectively, And the firms are more, not less able to react toany threats by élosing down, moving production and creating layotis.
It is because of this that withdrawal from the market will not lead tow lessening of pressure on the working class by these firms, but an imeresse. This is precisely because they will be weakened by withdrawal. The first thing that happened after Chile began nationalising firms was a flight of capital, an economic blockade, and the bepinning of the campaign which led to the ‘bosses strike’ of 1972. ‘The first thing which happened after the removal of the dictatorship In Portugal was a series of attempts to remove masses of capital from the country.
What will happen in Scotland is that the multinationals will make a huge noise about their eeonomic positions, start layoffs, start shutdowns - with the intention of forcing enough concessions out of the working class to make up for the losses they stand Lo suffer trom withdrawal - in other words to strengthen themselves as best they.can by the back door.
The effectiveness of such methods in the past have been pointed out belore. Ln his pamphlet ‘The Internationalisation of Capital’, the economist Rebin Murray shows that once firms reach a certain size, itis essentially possible for them to get round all the major means of control over their operations which are open to Capitalisl governments, or Mount pressure enough to force them to back down, He says, referring to the power that big firms have to move capital around to maximise returns: “While British Governments undoubtedly have the power to atfect capital movements through exchange control, they have been careful to limit the effects of these controls on the freedom of capital movement by international firms, “Yet we should also note that this power is far [rom ubsolute even if it were to be used seriously to curb the investments of international firms. We have already noted ways in which
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international firms can circumvent exchange controls! transfer pricing: the payment of fees and royalties al various ratee: the scheduling of intra-company debts- the allocation of overheads internationally: the timing of dividend payments and soon. These are all bound by limits, but taken logether they allow a considerable volume of funds to be transferred through the exchanges without control Further there is back-to-back financing which is difficult to detect if undeclared, while at crisis periods there is at leusi some straight smuggling, Where controls gre too severe and/or unavoidable, politico-economic pressure may be applied.At a time of international expansion the difficulty of enforcing exchange co ntrols may net beserious: butit would become critical in the event of an international crisis.""
The important factor involved ts this: that the effect of the multinational scale of operation of much of modern industry has already removed the ellectiveness ol many monetary measures which could be imposed even lo regulate the flow of invesiment and goods across British state boundaries. As Robin Murray says: “The particular long-term crisis in which Britain finds herself _.. hus constrained governments in such a way that they have not implemented policies which remain potentially ellective instruments of control. Third, measures which governments have taken to stabilise the economy have born particularly heavily on national capital and on the working class.”
In Scotland, where the scale of multinational investment is higher, and (he rest of the economy much weaker, the multinationals have been able towalk allover regional policy, will walk all over a Scottish Assembly, and will continuc to walk ull over the working class unless it organises - internationally - Lo use ils own strength against ther - and the pathetic measures which any parliament is capable of will not change that, But this makes nonsense of the argument thal the aim of withdrawal from the matket is to safeguard parliaments, Scottish or British, against dictals from Brussels. And itmakes nonsense ai (he argument Benn puts forward, that staying oulol the EEC “enables us to discriminate in favour of home-based industry’.
The capitalist class, on an international seale, - dictates 10 parliament and to the working class, and the HEC happens to be a very handy cudgel to enforee the dictatorship, As is obvious to any trade union militant, the weapon to fight! both the cudgel andits wielder is the working class - the organised force of the Labour Movement, To do so effectively, it net only hus to fight against being trapped inthe parliamentary prison which the labour party tries to keep it in, but when parliament serves the capitalists jas it usually does, under Labour Governments as well as Tory), it has to fight parliament. :
All the democratic rights whieh the working class has achieved were won through struggle, usually against the government of the time. The working class is still fighting the Labour Government now for the release of the Shrewsbury Twe. itis because the Labour left do not understand this simple, basic question that they jail 10 organise a united working class campaign mubilising the whole apparatus of the Labour Party.
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*Continue to defend policies, such as Labour's regional policy, which have not worked, which cannot work, which sre he substitute for full socialist planning under workers’ control, and which therefore discredit the anti-Common Market campaign.
What alternatives, therefore, lie before those forces active in the anti-Common Market campaign? 7. WHAT ALTERNATIVES? ‘The Common Market raises almostevery question of policy lacing the Labour Party in Britain today, and every question of strategy facing the working class. Benn, for example, referred to four busie issues invelved in the control of Of] resources ulone;
*What effect does the Common Market have on the planning of ehergy resources?
*How will the rate of exploitation of North Sea Uhl resources be determined?
*Who will assume control over the exploitation of the Continental shelf?
“Will the government be allowed to discriminate in favour of Home-based industry’?
What we have tried toshow in this pamphlet is that in relation toone central question - regional policy in relation to the development und structure of industry in Scotland any answer which relies on the use of parliamentary legislation alone against the multinationals and the capitalist system cannot work: equally that any strategy which conlines itsell to the framework of a single nation and fails to organise workers internationaliy cannot work, In the first pamphlet of this series, we showed the same applied to the development of oil resources in Scotland The [MG's national pamphlet on the Common Market, and out coverage in the Red Weekly, have shown thal the same conclusions apply to practically every sphere of concern to the workers’ movernent-trade, the defence of democratic rights, control of prices, etc.
The question which must be asked is therefore: ‘What kind of alternative policy is required?”
For the Labour lefts, the question of an allernalive policy is nothing more than a question of what programme the Labour Party will implement in government. Por us, soemihing far more basic involved.
Because we recognise, und we caf prove, that only socialist planning can deal with the immense economic and social problems faced by the working class, This means, for example, *Not a regional policy of tax cuncessions to the multinationals but the nationalisation of basic industries and the palnned development of Scotland's resources and industry
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*Not a policy of exchange control, import control and the occasional free trade agreement but complete control of all foreign trade, the opening of trade agreements with Comocon countries.
*The nationalisation of all oi-related indusiry and the formulation of a national energy plan and a plan for the exploitation of North Sea Oil. “The disbandment of all capitalist military alliances such as NATO.
*The nationalisation of all companies creating redundancies as opposed to state aid lor bankrupt monopolies. *Not isolating British workers from their European counterparts but fighting for a United Socialist States of Europe within which to plan on a European scale.
But who can enact such policies? Who can force the big companies lo give up their business secrets? Who can determine the real needs of workers and their families? Who can take over the factories from the capitalisis and run them for social need instead of profit! Who can carry through real socialist planning?
The answer is very plain, ltis the workers themselves. And this is why the policies of both left and right in the Labour Party fall so far short of what is newled, Because immediately the attempt is made to even begin to carry through the measures needed toimplement such plans, the capitalist class will pull cutevery weapon they possess.
The fall of the Allende regime in Chile shows only too well that they will not worry about safeguarding their parliament when it comes to their interests being defended. Only the organised working class can smash them once and for all.
For us therelore, an alternative policy is more than the measures a government will have to take. It embodies a policy [or the working class iiself to fight on.
And itis possible. When we wrote the first pamphlet in this series, we pointed oul the way in which Chilean workers had been able to enforce nationalisation of firms trying to engage in layolfs or in some cases just profiteering. Their example stands regardless of the bloody coup which [ollows. But since this, the Portuguese workers have shown in Europe itself the kind of action which can organise the light. When the slrugele against the giant Plessey company began lohotup, the first thing done was to contact workers occupying Plessey’s in England against redundancy, and setup links throughout the entire combine to fight jointly in Britain and in Portugal. The Portuguese workers’ co-urdinating committee has organised continual actions of solidarity with Portuguese workers, has sel up innumerable links between trade unionists in Britain and Portugal, and is organising constant actions of solidarity and support for the Portuguese workers.
But most dramatic of all was the action taken by Portuguese bank workers, When the big companies and investors got really worried about the course ot events, they made a mad rush to withdraw capital from the banks. The reaction of the bank workers was to prevent this themselves, to shut down the banks. to reluse to allow this massive ‘strike by capital’, and to luke to the streets against the bosses’ boycott, finally securing the full nationalisation of the banks.
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It was not the nationalisation itself, but the constant vigilance of the workers themselves over the financial transactions of the capitalists, which made this effective. They make it a hundred times more difficult for the bosses to carry out their backstage deals and manouvres. They used, very simply, workers" control in a limited, but decisive way, against the capitalists.
For us, it is this which provides the key component of any alternative to the Common Market: workers control, not just as a man on the board of directors but as a fighting weapon against the capitalists: workers action, not through parliament but direct action against every attack and every erosion of rights and conditions: and international workers' solidarity against the multinationals.
Fighting apart from each other, relying on false friends, relying on parlia, ent. the working class can be singled out and defeated by the capitalists. United, determined. and independent, it will triumph.
FORWARD TO THE UNITED SOCIALIST STATES OF EUROPE!
Scouned.
REFERENCES
I Scotland, 1 abour and Workers" Power: Scuttisht INu publication, September 1904
2i External control and Regional Policy by John Fum. from The Red Paper on Seoland. ed Lordon Brown published by Kdinburgh University student publications board, 1975
3 All sures Irom Stuesure and Growch of the Scottish Economy by Johnston. Huxton and Mair.
conomic Development and Devoluton, July 197
5i-Finance Capisal and she Lipper Classes, John Scol and Michael Husbes. also in the Red Paper on
61 The Internationalisation of Capital, by Hobin Murray. Spokesman publications offprint No.a.
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