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The massive turnout of over 60,000 in London on 17th November marked probably the largest mobilisation of public sector workers ever seen in Britain. All sections of the public sector were out, with five figure contingents from NUPE and NALGO Wave upon wave of demonstrators, many of whom had never been involved in any industrial action before — let alone gone on strike — marched from Hyde Park to Westminster. The demonstration took almost six hours to pass any point on the route.
It was an impressive show of feeling - but did it impress the Government? Certainly as the several thousand demonstrators from Scotland trooped off the trains and buses around dawn on Thursday morning, few had any illusions that the Callaghan Government is open to much persuasion. Everyone was conscious that the struggle to save social services from being decimated was only starting. Already defeats had been suf-
cred - the school cleaners strike and" Educational TV in Strathclyde are among the most obvious. In ETV, a rearguard action by NALGO members did manage at last to save the jobs of those affected.
The 17th November could be a turning point bur only if it marks the realisation that every closure, every cut in expenditure, has to be resisted, not only by the workers affected, but by the Labour movement as a whole. Certainly many tests are at hand — in Glasgow alone Partick bus garage. Knightswood youth centre and the District Council Building Department are under immediate threat. Only a massive campaign will prevent these services becoming ghosts from the past like ETV.
WALTER MeLELLAN (Asst. Sec. Glasgow Branch NALGO)