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INTERVIEW WITH A FRENCH TEXTILES MILITANT Introduction The problems faced by workers in declining industries is a subject we are becoming increasingly familiar with in Britain. Wages and conditions in such industries are often poor, and do not keep pace with more prosperous sections of the economy. The government of course, in only too eager to exploit the apparent division of interest this raises between different groups of workers. The question will then be asked: "Is it worth my going on strike when I know that profits are low, and I might lose my job?" Put in that way, there is no satisfactory answer; the reactions we have seen in Britain over the last year have all had their shortcomings. The leaders of the UCS workers tried hard to prove that really the inductry could be profitable to the owners; some of the workforce kept their jobs, but at the expense of signing a punishing agreement which they are likely to regret. The wormen at the Fakenham leather factory (see Socialist Woman Summer 1972) took over and formed their own cooperative, setting an example of what can be achieved by determination and militancy; but as they themselves are the first to admit, "workers self-management" can only be a temporary, personal solution in a competitive market economy. The movement in support of the dockers' fight to save their jobs was stopped before it had extended far encough to provide anything more than the most limited of guarantees to a very restricted section of the workforce.
We aren't attempting to provide a do-it-yourself instant solution here or to say that it is the duty of workers in such a situation to put their necks on the chopping-block; but just to argue that we can only work towards a solution as the problems of each section are recognised and taken up as the problems of all.
The sell-out of the Brannans strike (see Socialist Woman, Oct-Nov 1971) shows the particular relevance of this for traditionally imder-re presented and isolated sections of the workforce such as women. Most recently, the Hospital Auxillary Workers-recognising their own weakness-appealed for joint action against the freeze from other union members.
And the final object of such united action by the working class must be the only possible solution: the political and economic overthrow of this system and its replacement by one in which the working class controls society in its own interests. The following interview with Mile. Louise Dupont, a union militant in a small textile factory in a town near Toulouse, in the south of France, shows that these problems aren't restricted to Britain, and should warn us against such anti-internationalist "solutions" as that proposed last year by the TUC: turn back the clock and institute import protection measures against "foreign competition" in textiles. With Britain's entry to the common market we should instead be trying to organise joint action in defence of the interests of all European workers against the international bosses' alliance.
The Background The area around Mlle.Dupont's town has traditionally been important for wool textiles since the Middle Ages, for various historical and geographical reasons-the sheep, the water, the infertile mountain regions where the peasants could not live off farming alone, and the large numbers of skilled Protestants in the region, who being forbidden State Office in the 16th and 17th centuries, turned to industry. The local discovery in 1851 of a method of soaking the wool off sheepskins instead of shearing became another important factory.
However, most recently the industry reached its peak in the early 1930s, and has been in decline since the Second World War, particularly under pressure of competition from the more prosperous North of France and from Italy. This decline, and the generally high unemployment of the region is part of a wider picture within France in the sense that the whole of the Languedoc area in the South has its own identity as an "under-developed area", and has its own "nationalists" who campaign against the Paris government for its policy of running down their industry in favour of the promotion of tourism.
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However, the textile and associated industries are still the biggest local employers, accounting for abour 7,000 of the 10,000-13,000 workers in Castres. A particular aspect of this is the high mortality rate of small concerns, following on a sudden rush after the War by everyone "hairdressers and all"to buy their own looms. Those forced out go to work in the factories or migrate to Paris; those remaining largely do subcontracted work for the factories, as is the case with Mile Dupont's brother. Most of the large firms remaining are locallyowned.
The factory where Mile Dupont works employs about 60 workers -half of them men, half women-after a small start in 1956 with a total of 15. The factory's fancy sign and entrance hall are in contrast to the cramped and noisy conditions inside. Mile. Dupont complains that the workers aren't even given the space to do their work efficiently. For example, there are no racks where the bobbins of wool can be classified according to colour and quality-it is a matter of lifting out heavy sacks or boxes from a heap each time to sort out the ones required.
Q. Could you say something about the condition in the factory? "The boss likes to think of himself as enlightened; back at the beginning he would even lay on summer outings and feasts to keep us happy; but the workers have seen through it now. In fact pay and conditions are not at all good, and the management is always trying to save money at our expense. For example, they have introduced new machinery-one loom at double the normal width and some high-speed machines which need far more attention to mend and change the thread more often, as well as being very noisy. But we don't get paid any more. When we complained. the boss said he would perhaps pay more if productivity increased, but we never get further than "perhaps". The staff need a lift too, with the increased work running up and down stairs. The manage ment's agrees we should have one, but says the firm can*t afford it, so we must walk." (The goods lift has a big notice forbidding personnel to use it.) "The weavers are paid more than the others because of their high productivity, but it means they are slaves to the machine; there is no chance to look around, and they are forbidden to talk (though they break this rule as much as they can). We consider ourselves grossly under-staffed here with 6 looms to tend each, and we can't cover if anyone is off; but in some factories they even increase this to 11 or 12 looms per worker. The strains this imposes, and the fact that the new machines have to be kept running at night, means that more men are taking over the Other work, such as the rectification process, picking out the imperfections from the woven cloth, is considered women's work; it is clean, but very tedious and also tiring. It is a skilled job-it needs 3 years* training in all-but this is not recognised in the pay. and this is something which the union is taking up. "Other problems are the industrial hazards; for example, the noise of the looms- we all become deaf. You can't wear earplugs because of security and communication difficulties. And the fact that the looms are on the first floor should be illegal, as the vibration is very bad for the female organs. The factory security committee should look after this by law, but of course "There are three shifts a day, with extra pay for nights. Most of the women here are married and prefer the morning or afternoon half-day shift, from 5 to 12 or 12 to 7. They have to make their own arrangements for their children, so women with several young children generally don't work; but one woman here works the opposite shift to her mother to solve the problem of who looks after the children, in other cases, women work the opposite shift to their husband."
Q.Can you tell us something about union organisation here? "Well, the way it was introduced was rather surprising-people weren't thinking about unions at all. Then one fine day the boss went to a meeting of the Centre des Jeunes Patrons a bosses' association-and they were discussing unions. The Head of Staff had told him I was a trade unionist, and he got the idea that I was a workers' delegate. So he called me in to see if he could use me to start a boss's union, and said I could be union delegate." (The French union system is some what idfferent from the British-you have the workers delegate, rather like a shop steward who represents the workers to the boss, and is elected by all the workers, even non-union ones, and the union delegate, who represents the union to the workers and boss. In practice, it's often the same person.) "So I called a meeting of the workers, right in front of the boss, and I told them that it had always been the unions who'd ever won any rights for the workers, and it was up to the workers to pick their delegates not the boss, We ended up with over 50% unionisation, which is considered high here-mostly in the CFDT but a few in the CGT. These are the two biggest of the 3 main unions in France. The third is the CGT-FO, which split from the CGT after the war in opposition to the CT's Communist leadership. The CGT-FO is a staff rather than workers' union, and is especially strong in the Post Office. There are also two very small unions: the CFTC (Christian Federation) which split from the CFDT and represents about 5% of unionised workers, and a small fascist union, the CFT, which is not recognised by the government and represents about 1% of unionised workers. The CFT is strong in particular factories such as Citroen and Simca, and also in supermarkets. French unions are more like general unions than the craft or industrial unions more common in Britain. "Then we had some trouble with the factory committee. These committees were set up by De Gaulle, with representatives from management and unions-the committee president is always the boss, of course. The idea is to get the workers to "participate" to avoid disputes. Some of the delegates were confused by this: they thought that by talking nicely to the boss on this committee, they could get more out of him than by being caught between boss and workers as workers' delegates. They soon found out otherwise. But what happens more often is that we caucus before the meetings and just put up the same demands that we've already put up at our regular monthly meetings with management and get our bargaining done in both places. The boss complains that we've got the wrong idea, and tries to keep them separate. So really the scheme's backfired for them. "But it's still an uphill struggle. Most of the women just don't have time to be active though five of the delegates are womenand people are afraid of unemployment. Even if we went on strike, we'd have trouble to maintain it. But things are changing slowly: one of the biggest factories round here went on strike for 25c some years ago. They only got 5c. in the end, but that's not the point-the important thing was the opening up of the We take part in national and regional strikes called by the union. and the events in 1968 had an effect-some people became more militant and some less, but we came out on strike for three weeks. With the general change in the industry too, the workers are becoming more conscious. They go to technical schools now, instead of serving apprenticeships, and they're beginning to think in terms of conditions instead of just money. "The most recent event is a small illustration. We don't have any union facilities here -not even a notice board. So when the delegates wanted to call a meeting, we struck the notice on the clocking-in board, The next thing we knew was that we each got a letter from the Boss saying that if we did such a thing again without permission, we'd be out. So now we're fighting for our notice-board, and we'll go on till we get it." (Since the interview the boss has agreed to supply the notice boards). Interviewed by Marilyn Scotcher