Preparations are well in hand roth rinted May Day issue. Our readers
can help in several ways. First, we naturally bank on sclling many more
copics - so if readers would like to order extra to sell to their friends,
etc, this will help. Secondly, we want to organise the selling on as many
Way Day demonstrations as possible. We rely upon our readers to write in and
let us know if there is a demonstration in their town and also how best t-
organise the selling. In some cases we may be able to send someone to hetp
with this assuming that this would be worthwhile, Lastly, donations to
help to for this particular issue would be very welcome - several things
come to mind: perhaps you may ‘have a number of friends you would like
us to send sample copies to. If you could cover the cost of this it would.
be a very nractical method of help.
ase ae eee eS Ee ere Oe eee eee EE eaten le, a elec Ren ete a — WORKERS" CONTROL
A week cnd school is net nermally a thing about which te editoriniise, But it isn't necessary to excuse ourselves in this pyrthealuc cose
The decision of Voice of the Tnions, tie pornlar trade wpien paper cf the Labout left, to spenscr 4 study-group on workers! ecut wol,y is Lar more important then is realised inmany quarters. The demand fur industrial demecracy is ene which has ofte: been heard in the British Labcur movement and equally often subdued in the very political successes which the movement has achieved. Banished as a topic for discussien in the late fovhios, it has been kept alive as a hope only in the narrew circles of socialist discussion groups, until the last few months.
An amazing revival is now taking place. It is as if the Labour mevement, after many years in the wildermess, had snddculy recevered with its petential power the menery of its conscience, Already both the TUC and Labuur Party Conference have tentatively eccepted the need to re-open this question. Resoluticns demanding workers! participation in decision making Wave recently been approved by both bodies., Since then, prominent unicn leaders, like Sid Hill cof the Public Employees, have advocated the opening up of an extended discussion cn the problems involved, The initiative taken by Voice of the Unions can make an invaluable contribution tv this.
The absbract arguments for the extension of workers! control are simple, and well-established. It is absurd te regard political democracy as the summit of progress to freedom: if we can subordinate civic experts to popular control by elected town councillors, then there is no logical reasen why the technicians in industry should not work happily under the long-range control cf democratically chosen workers! representatives, If formal qualifications are at stake, then the trade union movement can boast already that it has trained administrators cf high calibre, who are in ns way inferior to the present board members, whose classical training and mouthfuls of silver cutlery do not secm to disqualify them, however littl: praztical knowledse they my have.
But in any case, the argument can no longer remain academic, abstruct. The plain fact is that the whole future of political democracy depends on the rapid growth of industrial democracy, The new patterns of ‘planning! which are being evolved under neo-capitalism cannot and will not coexist with traditienal collective bargaining procedures. But the political liberties of labcur, such as they are, depend on the power of the unions. If the labour movement is not to be vapovineé,, it has to direct its energies to controlling the planners, tn determining the vrioritics upon which they work, and to achieving power to do this with real effect. Such power cannot be realiscd if we cannot open the books of private industry to unien scrutiny, and secure control not merely of the peripheral areas of industrial discipline, but «f the central motors which drive the whole machine, "Ccntrol" over hiring, firing, and similar matters, important though they are, is a fiction if the books remain closed.
It is te be heped that this question will receive urgent and widespread ventilation next week end.