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Newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist)
170, Wandsworth Road, London, SW8 2LA. Phone 0171 627 0599,
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RCPB(ML) To Hold National Consultative Conference
Workers Cannot Accept that the Government Should Set Lowest Possible National Minimum Wage
Balkan Countries Oppose NATO Military Intervention
Continuing Campaign over Kent & Canterbury Hospital
On the UNISON National Conference
Government Stands in Contempt of International Law
Annual Bobby Sands/James Connolly Commemoration
July Issue of Progress off the Press
Lawrence Inquiry Shows Racism of British State
July Issue of Korea Friendship Bulletin
RCPB(ML) To Hold National Consultative ConferenceTHE Central Committee of the Revolutionary Communist Party of Britain (Marxist-Leninist) released the following announcement on June 20, 1998. The Central Committee of RCPB(ML) is organising a National Consultative Conference in London on the weekend of July 18-19, 1998, beginning at 10.00am. The aim of the Conference is to discuss the stage of the work of the Party in the context of its plan and practical programme which it has been developing and implementing in the period beginning with the Coventry International Seminar of January 1994. All activists and concerned people are invited to come along with their views on the topic under discussion and fully participate in the discussion as to the content and direction of the way forward. In this period RCPB(ML) has formulated its general line as summed up in the draft document There Is a Way Out of the Crisis, and on the basis of this general line put forward its Draft Programme for the Working Class. The National Consultative Conference will in particular discuss in this context the most important programme RCPB(ML) has set for itself to Improve the Content, Extend the Readership of its newspaper Workers’ Weekly, and the programme of the working class that the Party put forward in the context of the May 1997 election to Stop Paying the Rich – Increase Investments in Social Programmes! It is all the more crucial to take stock of the work and discuss how it should advance in the light of the present situation where Tony Blair has been put into office by the bourgeoisie to carry forward the offensive of the rich against the people. The Central Committee will be presenting a number of papers in order to facilitate discussion among the activists and concerned people at the National Consultative Conference. These will focus on developments in the objective situation, in the movement of the working class and people, and on the role and work of the Party at the present time. Attendance is by invitation. All the units and activists of the Party are encouraged to go all out to invite people to the National Consultative Conference on the basis of carrying on the discussion on the way forward among the workers, the youth and students, the women and other sections of the broad masses of the people. To receive an invitation write to CC of RCPB(ML) at 170 Wandsworth Road, London SW8 2LA, telephone 0171-627 0599, fax 0171-498 5407or e-mail: jbbooks@lineone.net. All Out for the National Consultative Conference! |
ON JUNE 18, the government announced its national minimum wage. From
next April the national minimum wage for adults will be £3.60 per hour and
£3.00 per hour for 18-21 year olds. On the same day the government
published the report of the Low Pay Commission. The report showed that the
Cabinet had ignored a number of the recommendations of the Low Pay Commission
which it had set up. It will not uprate the minimum wage in June 2000 to
£3.70 and it reduced the rate for the youth from £3.20 per hour to
£3.00 uprating it only in June 2000. Tony Blair wrote to the chairman of
the Low Pay Commission saying that the government had decided to “minimise
the risk that the recommended £3.20 an hour development rate for younger
workers could result in job losses at this critical point in the economic
cycle”.
What this shows is that whilst New Labour were pledged to introduce a statutory
minimum wage they have set the national minimum wage as low as possible, and in
doing so are utilising the logic of the capitalists. In putting in place a
statutory minimum wage, they are trying to show that indeed they are a
“fair” government when it comes to the workers, but that in every
other respect workers, especially young workers, should kow tow to their
exploiters and to the logic of doing everything to make business successful.
At the same time, much confusion is being spread and passions aroused around
the level of the national minimum wage. Workers are being encouraged to line up
according to the militancy of the demand that it should be set at such and such
a level or some other higher or lower level. In other words, even when workers
are encouraged to oppose what the Labour government is doing, it is still being
done on the grounds of what is fair and equitable, and not on the grounds that
workers have rights which should be affirmed and recognised. It is clear that
workers must demand that the level of a minimum wage be set as high as
possible, as well as demanding that benefits of the unemployed be raised. In
this respect, workers should reject what the Labour government has decided to
implement. The rights of the workers demand that they must fight to defend
their interests, otherwise they cannot be considered as more than mere slaves,
and if they do not do so, this is what they will be reduced to. It is correct
that at least there should be a statutory guarantee of a minimum wage so that
if this is violated, then the employer will be subject to legal sanction.
Workers should actually have a level of remuneration that allows them the
highest living standards and best working conditions within the present level
of the productive forces, which is in the interests of society and of progress.
But it is also the case that workers should set their own agenda for society,
and within this they have a right and should be in a position to determine the
price for the quantity and quality of the labour applied at work.
The Labour government, however, is building on the argument of the previous
government, which opposed the introduction of the national minimum wage because
of “economic circumstances” and that it would “cost jobs”.
Tony Blair declares himself for the “principle” of a minimum wage, as
he did at the TUC in 1995, when he said that a “minimum wage is a
declaration by society of the minimum value of any person’s labour”
but he has ensured that the national minimum wage is dependent on the interests
of the bourgeoisie to increase the exploitation of labour to the maximum and
that the lowest level of the minimum wage is set regardless of the misery and
poverty it will cause. To justify this he uses the arguments of his
predecessors and talks about the “critical point in the economic
cycle” of capitalism and that the minimum wage “must be set with
regard to the economic circumstances” and claims that to raise the level
of the minimum wage would “cause job losses”. The government
justifies its low rate for the minimum wage by quoting the argument that nearly
two million workers will gain from the level they have set. However, what this
reveals is not the high level of the minimum wage but the extent of the
polarisation of society between rich and poor, which has been increased by the
anti-social offensive and policy of the bourgeoisie to de-regulate the labour
market. This has lowered wages in Britain especially after the abolition of the
Wages Councils in 1993. At the same time, such an increase in poverty wages
which has brought about no corresponding reduction in mass unemployment gives
the lie to the claim of Tony Blair that raising the level of the minimum wage
would “cause job losses”.
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| ACCORDING TO news agency reports, the representative of US imperialism, Richard Holbrooke, has recently visited Belgrade, in order to put more pressure on the Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic to end the violent repression of the Albanian population in Kosova, which has led to hundreds of deaths and over 50,000 refugees in the last few months. Holbrooke claimed that his mission to the Balkans, which followed the breakdown of “peace talks” between the Belgrade authorities and representatives of the Kosovars, was to prevent “a general war”. However, he reiterated the warmongering threats of NATO that the Belgrade authorities must submit to its dictate and the bullying of the other great powers or face military intervention. The mission came in the wake of NATO’s military exercises over Macedonia and Albania carried out on June 15, which involved 80 NATO warplanes, including RAF Jaguars. It is reported that these were the largest military exercises ever undertaken in the Balkans. On June 11, NATO Defence Ministers agreed to develop “a full range of options” for military intervention not only in Kosova, but also in the neighbouring countries of Albania and Macedonia, stating that they would seek UN support if necessary. Holbrooke’s visit also follows increasing economic pressure on the Belgrade authorities from the EU, and the so-called “Contact Group” of countries – the US, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Russia. Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Canada and the US have agreed to implement a ban on new investment in Serbia and to freeze funds held abroad by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. They have also agreed measures to ban flights by Yugoslav airlines between Yugoslavia and their countries. Japan is to consider similar action. What is clear is that the big powers are not simply concerned with halting the repression of the Kosovars, as they make out, but also intent on dictating the future of Kosova and meddling in the internal affairs of other Balkan countries, such as Macedonia and Albania. The European Council and NATO have both brazenly stated that they remain opposed to the independence of Kosova, even though this is now the demand of most of the representatives of the Kosovars, including Ibrahim Rugova, whom the big powers have hitherto described as a “moderate”, and the Kosova Liberation Army (KLA), which has been fighting for an independent Kosova. The big powers, including Britain which has been at the forefront of the attempts to use military force in the Balkans, have no mandate for this sabre-rattling and blatant interference in the affairs of other countries. They have no business making pronouncements on the future of Kosova or any other part of the Balkans. Russia has already distanced itself from NATO’s action, and is opposed to NATO military intervention, which threatens its own historic influence in the Balkans. More recently, both Macedonia and Greece have made clear their opposition to NATO military action. Neither the interference of the big powers nor the so-called “peace talks” imposed by them have brought peace to the region. Indeed in recent months the violence against the Albanian population has intensified, while the Kosova question has escalated into a major and dangerous international dispute. From the beginning of this century, the interference of the big powers in this region has exacerbated national tensions, and just as at present, has created a volatile situation which the imperialists have exploited for their own strategic advantage. The conditions for peace and security in the region and an end to the violence in Kosova can only be brought about by ending NATO and other foreign interference in the Balkans and leaving the people of the region to sort out their own affairs. |
MOVEMENT AGAINST THE ANTI-SOCIAL OFFENSIVE |
| THE East Kent Health Authority (EKHA) is to meet on June 29 to make its decision on the future of the Kent & Canterbury Hospital (K&C). A vigorous campaign has involved hundreds of thousands of people, from all walks of life and sections of society, in the struggle to prevent the K&C from being downgraded, a struggle which has epitomised the strength of feeling about the direction of the NHS and the cuts in its services up and down the country. The campaign included a petition containing 300,000 signatures against the proposals, as well as the biggest marches through Canterbury in living memory. Protestors filling five coaches took the petition to 10 Downing Street, where the campaigners staged a demonstration bearing banners and posters. Nurses and midwives have warned the Health Authority that any decision to downgrade the K&C would have serious consequences for all sections of the community, including mothers and babies. Midwives involved in the Canterbury and South East Kent branches of the Royal College of Nursing’s response to EKHA’s consultation document have voiced serious misgivings about the changes proposed to obstetric care. The views are contained in a 34-page document which gives the views of nurses in every speciality from cancer and intensive therapy to community nurses and those caring for the elderly. The RCN feels that the EKHA’s proposals should be withdrawn until the government’s White Paper on health services is in place. The hospital’s board has also criticised the EKHA’s preferred proposal to downgrade the K&C, take away its A&E department and move the special care baby unit and cancer unit to other areas. The authority has also come under attack from consultant paediatrician Dr James Appleyard, who has accused it of ignoring the wishes of thousands of people. Campaigners also criticised an “exclusive” television report by Meridian on the eve of the end of the consultation period into the future of the hospital. The programme covered a review into possible blunders at the hospital, even though the review had been agreed last October. The campaigners point out that the television programme had been screened at the most damaging time for the K&C, and a hospital spokesperson said the programme’s slant was not right or justified. If the EKHA goes against the wishes of the people, the Canterbury and Thanet Community Health Council is set to refer the decision to the Health Secretary Frank Dobson. Also under consideration is an application for a judicial review in the High Court if the decision should go against the K&C. If that were successful, the EKHA would have to repeat the decision-making process, using all available information, not just the selective information supporting its preferred opinion. |
| THE National Conference of UNISON, a trade union that represents 1.3 million public service workers, took place in Bournemouth from June 16-19. Over 3,000 delegates as well as other visitors and guests from trade unions abroad participated. The President of UNISON, John McFadden, welcomed the delegates, visitors and guests. In his introduction to Conference, the General Secretary of the union, Rodney Bickerstaffe, said that it was the “services of our members that make for a civilised society”. Both among the delegates, returning for this year’s Conference from every area of the public services, and in the 228 motions to conference were expressed concern and anger that not only have the cut-backs on public services and attacks on the jobs, wages and conditions of members not ceased since the election of New Labour but they have continued and got worse. For example, in one of the motions tabled for conference the union challenges the whole view of New Labour towards the NHS and the welfare state and points out that such a vision of society is not a modern one but is retrogressive. It points out that if UNISON is to face these increasing cut-backs to public services, the continued privatisation of these services under the Public Private Partnership or PFI then UNISON must fight against these attacks using as a focus a modern vision of society where the rights of all to education, health care, local authority services, public utilities, and social welfare are guaranteed and universal. It was this desire which characterised many of the views of delegates in adopting a motion putting forward a Fuel and Water Poverty Charter, in debating the motions on the Private Finance Initiative and on the National Minimum Wage. It was also reflected in the outrageous examples of sacked care workers at Tameside who addressed conference, of the sacked ancillary workers at Hillingdon and Fazakerley and Walton Hospital who were present. In the debate on the motions and amendments, delegates pointed out that although the union was involved and supported the immediate struggles and strike action planned against the introduction of PFI what was at stake was that the union was involved in a “long term battle for the future of public services”. This battle is none other than the just struggle of all the working class and people to defeat the anti-social offensive started by Margaret Thatcher and now being continued by New Labour. It is a struggle that cannot be reduced to a policy of attempting to modify the policy of the Labour government but only by the workers adopting an alternative programme that today a modern society should provide the highest standard of public services for all, guaranteed by society and publicly owned and that all these demands are met. |
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PFI Lobby of Parliament |
| UNISON is organising a lobby of parliament on Wednesday, July 8. The union points out that PFI (Private Finance Initiative) represents a threat to the whole NHS, and that it is important that the lobby shows the strength of feeling of health staff on the issue of PFI in the NHS. Regions will be lobbying MPs throughout the day, from around 10.00am to 4.00pm, arguing the case against PFI in the NHS. |
| In a recent Press Release, the United Campaign to Repeal the Anti-Trade
Union Laws details how Britain’s laws governing workers’ struggles
and the activities of the trade unions, particularly in relation to strike
struggles, put the government in breach of international laws and Treaties to
which the United Kingdom is a signatory and by which it is bound. The Campaign
condemns the recent White Paper “Fairness at Work” for failing to
propose the repeal of these laws, and points out that Britain’s anti-union
laws have been consistently censured by the United Nations Committee on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the International Labour Organisation
(ILO), and the Council of Europe.
The press release points out that, for example, the ILO has condemned
Britain’s laws against secondary action and other legislation against the
workers’ right to organise in defence of their economic and political
interests. Almost annually the ILO has instructed Britain to bring its
industrial legislation into line with its obligations as a founding signatory
to ILO Conventions 87 and 98, but the present Labour government, as with the
Conservative government before it which introduced a whole armoury of
anti-worker legislation, has not responded. The press release emphasises that
Britain “cannot go on ignoring its international obligations, especially
at a time when the Foreign Secretary proclaims an ‘ethical foreign
policy’ in which (according to the Annual Report on Human Rights published
by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International
Development in April, page 9): ‘All internationally respected human rights
are equally important. Economic, social and cultural rights must be judged as
equal with civil and political rights and in all cases these are the rights of
individuals.’” It is interesting to note here that the government
appears to be specifically ruling out the possibility of collective rights. John Hendy QC, who is Joint Secretary of the United Campaign, is quoted as saying: “It is a stain on Britain’s international reputation that it continues to flout its European and global obligations and that the Government have not used this opportunity to rejoin the civilised world community.” The United Campaign to Repeal the Anti-Trade Union Laws incorporates Reclaim our Rights, the Free Trade Unions Campaign, and is in co-operation with the Communication Workers Union Campaign and the Liaison Committee for the Defence of Trade Unions. It is calling for a national demonstration to take place in London on May 1, 1999. The United Campaign can be contacted by telephoning 0171-638 7521 or faxing 0171-638 7507. |
| ON SATURDAY, June 13, the Wolfe Tone Society organised the Annual Bobby Sands/James Connolly Commemoration at the Irish Centre, Camden Town in London. Several hundred people attended the day’s events. 1998 marks the bicentenary of the rising of the United Irishmen, led by Wolfe Tone. In 1798, as the programme for the commemoration day pointed out, Wolfe Tone proclaimed: “To break the connection with England, the never failing source of all our political evils, and to assert the independence of my country – these are my objects.” The Wolfe Tone Society also pointed out that 1998 was also a significant year by virtue of the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, of which the Republican forces are taking advantage. The 1998 commemoration rally brought together these two themes. The main speaker at the afternoon rally was Caoimhghin O Caolain, Sinn Fein TD in the Dail, the Irish parliament. He spoke of the Good Friday Agreement as a stage in the struggle to bring an end to partition and to win a united, socialist Ireland. John McDonnell, Labour MP for Hayes, also spoke. A message from RCPB(ML) was read to the rally (see text below). The message was warmly applauded. Throughout the day Party activists distributed several hundred copies of the recent Workers’ Weekly edition containing the Party’s analysis of the Good Friday Agreement, as well as running a bookstall Earlier in the day workshops were organised on the topics of policing, of political prisoners and of the peace process. In the evening a social was held at which traditional and patriotic Irish music was played. |
| RCPB(ML), its paper Workers’ Weekly, and John Buckle Books are honoured to once again participate in this commemoration dedicated to Bobby Sands, James Connolly and all those who have laid down their lives for Irish freedom over the centuries. The commemoration takes place this year at a crucial time in the struggle. Despite the fact that the Good Friday Agreement does not address the most important principle of the sovereignty of the Irish people over their whole territory, and institutionalises both British jurisdiction over the six counties and the sectarian divisions resulting from centuries of foreign rule, nevertheless there is no doubt that the Irish people, and their political organisations such as Sinn Fein, will use this opportunity as a spur and a springboard to step up their struggle to realise their aspirations for an end to British rule and to the partition of their country. In solidarity with their fellow workers in Ireland and in their own interests, shoulder to shoulder with the Irish working people resident in Britain who militate in their ranks, the working class and all progressive people here in Britain can have no less a vision for the Irish as for themselves – to vest sovereignty in the people and realise the dream to build a bright future for the present and coming generations. The demand must continue to be the complete end of British rule over part of Ireland and an end to British interference in the affairs of its people. |
| Workers’ Weekly has received an advance copy of Progress, July 1998, Issue No. 6. Progress is the publication of the African and Caribbean Progressive Study Group (ACPSG). The publication carries a lead article on the inquiry into the murder of Stephen Lawrence, which we are taking this opportunity to publish below, which focuses attention on the racist nature of the British state. The 14-page issue of Progress also contains articles on One Year of Labour in Power, Nuclear Tests in India and Pakistan, Centenary of the Birth of Paul Robeson, Intervention in the Affairs of Africa, A Bank With a Difference: Relief Society of Tigray’s Rural Credit Scheme, Truth and Reconciliation – A Flawed Judicial Process, and 7th Anniversary of Modern Democracy in The Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, as well as a number of Readers’ Letters, CD and Book Reviews, and a reprint of Fidel Castro’s statement of welcome on the visit of Pope John Paul II to Cuba in January. Progress and ACPSG can be contacted through e-mail at: Kobina@Dial.Pipex.Com. Workers’ Weekly would like to congratulate all concerned in the production of Progress, and wishes ACPSG every success in its work. |
| APRIL 1998 marked the fifth anniversary of the murder of Stephen Lawrence
who was brutally stabbed to death whilst waiting at a bus stop with a friend in
Eltham, South London, on April 20, 1993. Family and friends held a vigil at the
spot where he was killed on the anniversary of his death but the tragic fact is
that no-one has been brought to justice after all this time despite the best
efforts of the Lawrence family.
While the family and friends of Stephen Lawrence have remembered him in
private, a recently launched public inquiry has unearthed a catalogue of
negligence and blunders on behalf of the investigating officers which fully
substantiates the Lawrence’s family’s belief that their son’s
murder was not treated with sufficient seriousness by the so-called forces of
law and order because of the nationality of the victim.
The reluctance on the part of the police to launch a serious investigation
meant that the alleged perpetrators, well known in the local area for their
racism and violence against black people, were given a large amount of time in
which to dispose of any incriminating evidence and so avoid prosecution. After receiving a tip off the police waited a full two weeks before raiding the house of Neil and Jamie Acourt, two of the alleged murderers. The police did not conduct a comprehensive search of the Acourts’ house which would have included searching under the floorboards, despite having received information that knives had been hidden there. Their search nevertheless uncovered a number of knives, an air pistol and a blood-stained jacket. Detective Sergeant Kirkpatrick, who was in charge of the murder enquiry at the time, has denied protecting the Acourts but said that he did not know whether the information passed to the police on the tip off (about knives hidden under the floorboards in the Acourts’ house) had been passed on to the search team who later searched the Acourts’ home. The public inquiry heard that 39 separate pieces of information were passed to the police within days of the murder by members of the public linking the Acourts and three friends with Stephen’s murder but that the police did not make any arrests for a further two weeks. What this inquiry has revealed more than anything else is the racist nature of the criminal justice system in Britain. Stephen’s murder highlights, more than anything else, the catalogue of abuses the various national minority communities have to contend with. The media still refer to Stephen as “a promising A-Level student” as if to separate him and his murder from the situation of other national minorities. The public inquiry is an attempt by the state to “lay various ghosts to rest” under the guise of exposing the ineptitude of individual police officers. What is on display, however, is the nature of the British state itself which has fostered racism and violence against national minority communities as an integral part of the development of modern Britain. Racism and violence against national minorities was instrumental in the acquisition of Britain’s wealth first through slavery and later through colonialism and neo-colonialism and a public inquiry cannot alter that fact. The Lawrence family will not find justice in the current public inquiry because as long as the conditions for further violence against national minority communities continue it will just be a matter of time before another family suffers a similar loss. The fight has to be against the forces in society which foster and encourage racism and people of all nationalities have to take a stand to defeat these forces once and for all. (Reprinted from Progress, Issue No. 6, July 1998) |
| THE July Issue of the Korea Friendship Bulletin has just been mailed out, produced by the Korea Friendship and Solidarity Campaign (KFSC). In its six pages, the Bulletin contains many informative articles about the situation in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, its national and international activities, and actions in support of the DPRK, as well as of the struggles of the people in South Korea in demanding change. A short article “Welcome to the new IMO Ambassador to London” reads: “The Korea Friendship and Solidarity Campaign welcomes Mr Pak Jong Il, the new DPRK ambassador to the International Maritime Organisation in London. We send Mr Pak Jong Il and all his colleagues and family our best wishes for the future and hope that relations between our two countries will improve and hasten the day when normal diplomatic relations are established.” The KFSC is planning future activities throughout the summer and autumn. For details and to obtain a copy of the Bulletin, write to: Korea Friendship & Solidarity Campaign, BCM Box 7970, London WC1N 3XX. |
