The Employers' Offensive: Productivity Deals and How to Fight Them. Tony Cliff, Pluto Press, 6/-.
"Productivity bargaining" is by no means a recent development as such. It has been a constant feature of pay settlements in industry for some time now. However, there is undoubtedly a major difference between what is a perennial problem for management (squeezing more surplus value out of its work force) and their determined attempt, mediated and centralised through the State (DEP) to tie all wage claims to "productivity deals" which, as the CBI Vice-President admits, signify "...a new way of of Work (or life) for a new wage structure The difference can indeed be measured by what Mr. Runge so euphemistically calls a "new way...of life". The only way employers can mercase producuvuty is dy undermıning mose traditional work practices which concretely represent the control of workers over the job and which "stand in the way of" efficiency. The Wilson Government has only too willingly supplied the spearhead in this operation. often whipping even "reluctant" and "soft" employers into line(2). MDW in the car and engineering industry, OMO in public transport, Devlin on the docks and O & M in the offices cut right across those limited measures of power which the shop-floor has won in struggle over the years-rights to mutually decide wages and conditions, safeguards against redundancy and work intensification, etc.
Running right through productivity deals is an implicit attack on such power, on the extent of participation in decision-making which is concretised in the shop steward. By increasing the primacy of management in the factory or garage, which is the natural result of MDW, "labour mobility" or those "penalty clauses"* Ilke those introduced at Fords, the role of the steward is rendered more and more superfluous, as Cliff points out(3). In other words, because they attempt to restore "managerial orero duve at the expense of shop-floor control, productivity deals represent a political problem. In this sense they cannot be divorced from the general strategy of the ruling class which has tried through the Incomes Policy and anti-trade union legislation (which culminated in the TUC's "Programme for Action") to equally undermine the strength of the labour movement, particularly at grass-roots level. LEADERSHIP If these deals have had some measure of success in their implementation to date- -210C1101 correctly estimates about 6 million workers are now operating them in some form or anotherit is not only because of the "soft-soap" techniques of management who are very adept at luring rank-and-file negotiators into the productivity trap by means of huge wage carrots.
It is primarily due to the level of consciousness of a whole strata of trade unionists who, rising to leading positions during boom-time conditions, are often quite unable to grasp the long-term strategic harm of such deals This is primarily the reason why even the "lefts" in the union hierarchy have embraced them so willingly- -Scanlon helping the introduction of MDW in the car and engineering industry and Jack Jones pushing containerisation on the docks and OMO in transport. Captivated with the idea of a "high-wage economy" (i.e. lacking an alternative socialist policy), their aim is reduced to getting the best they can out of such deals with certain "reservations" and "qualifications". It is an identical attitude they showed in the struggle against "In Place of Strife" which, because they accepted the Government's premise that militants had to be disiplined, ended in the TUC compromise.
The struggle against productivity deals is not then merely an industrial one concerned with wages and conditions: because such deals are an integral part of an offensive strategy by the ruling class to destroy the independence and power of the shop-floor, it is a political one which is inseparable from the fight inside the trade unions to create an alternative socialist leadership.
CLIFF'S PREMISES Cliff is quite clear on the strategic importance of these deals by seeing them as a deliberate and well-planned attempt to "shift the balance of forces in industry significantly in its (the employers') favour",(5) His concept of combatting them also correctly pivots around the question of power, or, as he himself asks, ..now tar can we improve our control over the situation, maintain and advance the level of organisation inside the factory and limit the management s power to dictate to the But "control" is an ambiguous word: it depends very concretely on how you evoke an awareness of it and what political forms such an awareness takes. In Cliff's approach, it nowhere ex tends beyond a syndicalist concept which sees the struggle for "power" confined to the shop-floor. His starting point, despite affirmations to the contrary, is not "how to help forge through our intervention and propaganda an alternative political leadership" but "how can we get the best deal possible within a given situation". The two approaches are not mutually exclusive-but they are resistance to any form of productivity deal, the logic of his position is to be drawn into the deal in order not to become "isolated" from the rank and file-a logic which actually incurs his criticism of those who stand out, warn and explain what productivity deals really mean:
"The alternative of maintaining an inflexible attitude of rejection of any productivity deal can lead to a catastrophic division between the stewards and their membership which will be eagerly exploited by the employer and may lead.. to the aceptance of a far worse deal than was necessary.
This is, of course, the logic of syndicalism because it starts within the employers' terms of reference that only through productivity deals can wage claims be granted. He surrenders a principle without firing a single shot and all that remains, as we shall see, is to make tactical gains within these confines.
BEST DEAL POSSIBLE It is not as if the image Cliff presents-of a money-hungry rank and file pressurising its leaders to talk "package deals"-is correct. In the case of the London busmen's productivity deal in '67 and the engineers' in '68, the exact reverse was the case-it was the union leadership.
But even if the rank and file are tempted by the "carrot"
-wics many pecause no consistent struggle has been waged to explain to them the implications of such deals-it is important to stand firm against the concept that workers, through an attack on their control, should shoulder the responsibility of the Government's rationalisation plans. It is not a quesuon or numbers-arouga me moruy such a fight will win to begin with will be a majority after the workers have tasted the deal in practice-it is a question of trying to enlarge the political consciousness of the workers through such deals. Cliff's whole approach blurs over this aspect: such comments as "the gir] who starts by saying No gets a higher price for her virtue than the girl who talks money at the onset"(7) panders to the syndicalist leanings of many stewards today and presupposes, of course, that the "virtue" will be sold. PRINCIPLE?
It is very important to understand the big psychological step implied in moving from rejection of a deal to acceptance. It means demonstrating before the membership that you are willing to sell conditions for cash. From that point on, any objections you might raise on the the best you can out of such a deal witi framework imposed by the employers.
himself admits this is his aim when he "We must always remember [!] to opposing the Productivity Deal and if necessary, retreat to a position wher try and get the best out of the deal we The point is that by accepting the p of this type of bargaining, the difference remain will appear to the rank and file as secondary issues. This is precisely where management is so astute. The implicat productivity deal (i.e. redundancy ete as Cliff correctly states, "so early on the shop floor". (8) They cannot be se all management wants is a commitmer principle which will be concretised in further stages and which commits the pattern of bargaining which accepts the p that conditions can be sold for cash. As Donovan clearly states in his report:
"In productivity bargaining, the signa marks the end of the negotiating stage:
beginning of the implementation. "*(9 "SAFEGUARDS"
figh ing ate deatfrom within mis strat fighting the deal from "within dangerous. It blurs over the qualitative ste which acceptance of the deal means-but than that, it puts forward a pattern of di which are by no means unacceptable to management. Cliff's pivotal demand is tha "mutuality". Recognising the fact that productivity deals hit at the power of the floor, his answer is to assert, through thi demand, the control already won throug struggles. As he himself puts it "Whether it be mobility of labour, job evaluation, overtime or safety, the demand mutuality strikes a dagger at the heart of a productivity deal..
The point is, of course, that this is not t Why is it, may we ask, does Jack Jones, no cavam ns aonerence to orocucu aa precisely this reservation? As he recently s a speech in Essex: ye don t quiddie on t principle of negotiating efficiency deals provided the principle of mutuality is agre "Mutuality" is by no means incompatible management's long-term plans for factory shake-ups-macca, itis orten acuver encouraged by them as a means of ensurin union is implicated as a co-partner in any changes that may later prove unpopular on shop floor! If Cliff isn't aware of this, may quote to him the Rootes Coventry Deal (15 the Lucas CA V deal or the Otis Agreement among many others-particularly the latter which states:
*...the immediate target of the company to reduce time standards through negotiati and mutual agreement by an appropriate amount of six million minutes This is not to say such procedures are standard practice in all agreements-it dep on how far the management think they have to go in making concessions. But the quite amenable to such demands provided get across the principle of Measured-Day "labour mobility" O & M, etc. Why in he name does Cliff think they are so keen or stewards taking courses in work-study, et some unions like the ETU already provide own? Precisely because they can then com back and "mutually"
asice o mana?me changes after they have been suitably indoctrinated in management's approach NEGATIVE APPROACH?
Cliff's book is undoubtedly of value for the information it presents concerning the na and extent of productivity deals. But he f suggest, in his strategy for combatting thes approach which goes beyond the old synd approach of "getting the best you can the deal. The demands formulated by Chiff, precisely because thev are tactical manoes within the confines of the Government's surategy, are unus meaningiess This is not to suggest that a socialist hero ch tomuh degis teld beat ter "an empty negative" approach. The) should be a clear rejection tied to a series ol postuve wansinonal demands wnicn asscrl only the power already won at shop-floor le but which seek to extend that power as part bulding an alternative socialist leadership. S a programme is illustrated in A Socialist Pol for the Trade Unions which seeks to group around a genuine revolutionary programme militants and I socialists in the labour move movement("h).
A. D. Scott NOTES (1) P. Runge: The Relations of Product Price and Wage Control, p.14. (2) cf. e.g. Barbara Castle's intervention in London busen's productivity negoti (3) Chapter 4, "Undermining the shop ste» (4) P.25 (5) P.212 (6) P.212 (7) P.216 (8) P.23 (9) Donovan Commission, Report No. . 39 "Evidence of Esso Petrole
myth of racial inferiority has been used to this direction, it is, whatever the reasons (lack