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No. 16, November, 1979

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No. 16, November, 1979 No 16 November 1979 1Sp BRITAIN BL workers: Seize the •I 15 • With unemployment the resources to back already aiming towards the losers', sneered Sir two-million mark and in­ Michael. flation predicted to top 20 per cent next year, Sir Betrayal after betrayal Michael Edwardes' an­ nouncement in early Neither does the working September that British class! Not one more job Leyland would die without must be sacrificed to keep massive surgery and the interest pay~ents another transfusion of (which devoured more than government cash was hardly half of the £48 million welcome news for the pre-tax profits for the ruling class. The Ryder first six months of this Plan instituted under year) rolling into the Wilson's Labour government hands of the banks and was supposed to have been former shareholders of BL's salvation, through a this nationalised capi­ programme of nationalis­ talist loser. The only ation and rationalisation worthwhile 'vote' in underwritten to the tune Edwardes' phoney refer­ of £1000 million from the endum is to burn the state's coffers. Four ballot. years and £775 million But BL workers are sad­ later, BL self-evidently dled with a do-nothing remains the 'sick man' of leadership and demoralised a sick economy. by a 'string of defeats, Since his appointment including last year's by Labour as BL chairman, closures of the Speke and Edwardes has added his own Southall plants. At Park ruthless touch to the Royal, workers have Labour rationalisation already opted for a redun­ scheme: in the past eight­ dancy offer of several een months jobs have been thousand pounds (predi­ slashed at the rate of cated on uninterrUpted 1000 every month. To no production until the plant avail -- BL's sales have Leyland workers demonstrate against proposed sackings, London, 9 October shuts down next June). MG- continued a steady de­ Abingdon may survive the cline, its share of the cuts, but only because of domestic market slipping to 20 per cent. cost of eight plant closures, five more partial a concerted outcry fromMG faddists around the Despite the Thatcher government's proclaimed closures and a minimum of 25,000 redundancies world; the bureaucrats have not lifted a commitment to a policy of denationalisations and (to hit upwards of 40,000 in the wake of yet finger in defence of its workforce. no more bail-outs, right now it is not likely to another 'productivity incentive' scheme). And to On the contrary, the Confederation of Ship­ let BL just go by the boards. The chronically make absolutely clear that he is out to snap the building and Engineering Unions has actually ailing balance of payments is already in the spine of militant trade-union defence of working come out in open support of the sacking of red; BL's demise would lead to the loss of conditions, Edwardes has singled out London's 25,000 of its members. The Transport and General another £900 million in exports. And the politi­ Park Royal bus plant -- with enough orders on Workers Union bureaucracy, representing half the cal consequences could be even more disastrous: the books to keep it busy another two years -­ BL workforce, followed by the small white-collar hundreds of thousands more unemployed, with a which he claims must be shut down 'simply be­ TASS, were more discreet -- but they are simi­ particularly cataclysmic effect in the indus­ cause of the appalling lack of productivity' . larly doing next to nothing to fight Edwardes' trial heartland of the Midlands. The bosses responded to some tepid verbal proposals. Edwardes' plan was also rejected by Edwardes' real message is union-busting opposition from BL shop stewards by playing a 13 October mass meeting of Leyland shop stew­ blackmail. Leyland's workers will have to beg 'workers' participation' for all it is worth. A ards. Yet beyond vague promises of support for for 'survival' (illusory though it may be) -­ 'Secret Ballot on the Company's plan for the any plans to resist the closures, all these and pay the price. If BL is to go to the govern­ recovery of BL' was.posted to everyone of the 'leaders' have offered by way. of strategy'is a ment for the remainder of its subsidy and yet 165,000 employees. Foremen were sent to pros­ call for blacking any work transferred from another handout, then BL workers have to acqui­ elytise for a 'yes' vote on the line, special threatened plants. esce to Edwardes' proposal that the failing appeals issued to the 'wives and families', even What else can they offer? Down the line they motor ~iant 'be streamlined in terms of plants a piece of cinematic trash entitled 'The Big all hailed the 39-hour week (to be implemented and slimmed down in terms of people' -- at a Decision' was churned out. 'We just do not have continued on page 2 workers tear off the social-democratic strait­ for the nationalisation~ without compensation of jacket which holds them responsible for re­ the entire automotive industry and the banks if Leyland ... pairing the bosses' economy. No bargaining over jobs are to be protected' (Socialist Press, 17 (Continued from page 1) government bail-outs, no negotiating over who October, emphasis in original). gets the axe, no agonising over alternative But for all the WSL's sputtering against the in 1981!) cajoled out of the engineering em­ recovery schemes -- Seize the plants! For im­ Stalinists; nationalising the car industry can ployers through the recent weak-kneed one and mediate occupation of all BL plants, the only 'protect jobs' if it is part and parcel of two-day strikes as a 'historic victory'. And occupations to be run by rank-and-file elected a chauvinist campaign to 'buy British' in order shaving 12 minutes off the work-day is not much factory committees! Hit the bosses where it to prop ~p the ailing national economy. It is of a basis for fighting mass redundancies hurts -- not just Leyland, but an immediate patently obvious from the Leyland experience through work-sharing on full pay. industry-wide strike! that by itself nationalisation is not going to Not that a fighting programme was forth­ Not one penny lost, not one job lost! Any protect jobs. In the decade following 1963, cQming from the fake Trotskyists of the Inter­ necessary retraining and relocation must be at Britain's share of car production in Western national Marxist Group (IMG) and Workers the bosses' full expense. For work-sharing on Europe and Japan fell from 27 to 11 per cent Socialist League (WSL) , who also lauded the full pay -- not a 39-hour week but thirty hours and with lost sales have come tens of thousands engineering strike outcome as a 'historic hours for forty hours' pay! For unemployment benefits of lost jobs, whether in nationalised companies breakthrough' (Socialist Press, 10 October). In equal to full pay and guaranteed by the state! or not. virtually identical interviews on facing pages Let the bosses try to get Leyland out of its The plight of Leyland workers will not be of the IMG's Socialist Challenge (18 October), bind. solved by a Leyland writ large -- a nationalised Socialist Challenge supporter and Jaguar stew­ British car industry propped up by subsidies ard Paul Shevlin and WSL leader and Cowley scab For bankruptcy under workers control? lifted from the taxpayers' pockets and bolstered deputy convenor Alan Thornett came out with against international competition'by protection­ virtually identical calls for 'resistance' BL's crisis condition is the product of ist import controls. This is nothing but the by the plants already targeted for the axe -­ decades of gross mismanagement, miserly capital reformist, inherently chauvinist, formula for and occupations only in those plants. under investment and a well-earned notoriety for dividing up a shrinking pie -- 'saving' car Certainly the threatened plants must fight shoddy quality and service, accelerated by the workers' jobs in Britain at the expens~ of the the sackings. But a fight centred just on those situation in the motor industry internationally jobs of car workers internationally. Indeed the plants would be doomed to 'defeat. It is pre­ and further aggravated by the overvaluation of whole reformist hue and cry over saving Leyland cisely this sort of narrow parochialism with British export goods. Dividends were lavish and is infused with social-chauvinist sentiment over which Thornett justified his support of Cowley's capitalist commonsense scarce -- as much as 'our' nationalised motor industry -- a foul scabbing on the national engineering strike. fifteen years after the merger of Austin and foretaste of the furore these 'socialists' will (See 'Alan Thornett: Scab!', Spartacist Britain Morris the two divisiohs maintained separate whip up to save 'our fatherland' in the event of no 15, October.) Thornett must be breathing easy books and separate boards of directors. Even another inter-imperialist war foreshadowed by that 'his plant is not among those bestowed with should Edwardes' latest speed-up scheme succeed, stiffening protectionist barriers. the privilege of single-handed 'resistance'! BL's targeted production capacity would still be Leyland workers must demand to see the books, The parochial, craftist outlook which leads less than half that of its major capitalist but not in order to counsel the ruling class on workers to view their interests as separate from competitors internationally. how better to run a bankrupt industry, or worse those of other trades and other factories is a Little wonder that even the right-wing Tory yet, to run it themselves as a 'socialist' reactionary and divisive hangover from the era Spectator (22 October) has offered the following island in a capitalist sea.
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