On 12 July the Argentinian regime arrested Hugo Blanco, Peruvian revolutionary and militant of the Fourth International. He is now threatened with deportation.
Blanco was released from jail in Peru only eighteen months ago after seven and a half Valley, Cuzco, to occupy the big estates. The landowners and the regime turned the armed forces on them, and the movement was bloodily suppressed in 1963.
The Velasco Alvarado regime had been in power some time before it released Blanco, in December 1970-long enough to have effected a temporary "stabilisation" in the countryside by means of the land reform, which has been the most far-reaching in Latin America, while leaving imperialist interests untouched. Even in this situation, however, Blanco was enough of a threat to the military regime for them to deport him to Mexico, in September, 1971. INCREASING REPRESSION The Peruvian left is continuing to demand Blanco's return, despite the increasing repression they face. The regime has now completely dropped its "progressive" mask. In the past few weeks a series of localised general strikes, in Puno and elsewhere, have been viciously put down, and the total number of deaths may never be known.
Blanco has stated a preference for deportation to Chile. but no news of his release has yet arrived.
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of the report reflected this. The report contains no guarantees that favourable agreements will be reached between the unions and the container firms. Without this, representatives of the men who closed Chobham Farm could hardly accept the report. A secondary objection was that pushed for by the Hull delegation. They wanted something done about the unregistered ports whose growth has accompanied a decline of the traditional ports, most markedly on Humberside. The only proposal here was for a 7 per cent levy which again was not guaranteed. Hull's objection to the agreement has a firm basis.
DECLINE OF THE TRADITIONAL PORTS The unregistered ports and wharves are booming. Felixstowe is now handling 2½ million tons and this is scheduled to more than double in the next few years. In the Trent and Ouse estuaries of the Humber the unregistered whatves are handling 450 per cent more than they did ten years ago:
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Thomas Brady — The Historical Basis For Tilbury docks - deserted as a result of the strike The spectacular growth outside the Docks Labour Scheme (established in 1947) is rooted in several factors. Firstly, basic pay on the unregistered Humberside wharves, for example, is exactly 50 per cent of the basic rate in London at £21. In addition, the registered employers pay a surcharge on their wages bill to support voluntary redundancy payments, fallback money for men on the TUR, and pension schemes. Secondly, the registered ports have militant and "ill disciplined" work forces. Discipline is in the hands of a joint board and in effect the men cannot be fired. Thirdly, job flexibility exists on the unregistered wharves. On some wharves on the Humber even crews have helped to unload cargoes.
As a result the handling rates are higher in the older ports and the difference is leading to a selection of new wharves by the shippers and a flow of capital to develop them. In addition, land values in the Port of London are enormous and massive profits have been made by companies like Hays Wharf which have sold out to developers.
The 7 per cent levy on the wages bill of the unregistered ports will not stop this decline. Given the increased expense of supporting the currently unattached dockworkers on full pay. the registered employers face a growth in expen ses at least as great as the 7 per cent in the other ports. If the numbers accepting severance are much short of 14 per cent the effect on loading rates could be very much greater than elsewher On balance, then, the agreement is likely to spread the decline rather than halt it. SECURITY The conditions of the dockworker are by no means secured for all time by the report. Attempts to get rid of surplus labour could we emerge again a few years after this proposed reduction, just as they have emeiged a few years after the wave of redundancies which too place in the late '60s. In fact, only the monopoly position and militancy of the dockers hav protected their conditions so far.
The continued expansion of the non-registered ports means an increasing proportion of trade will pass through the hands of dockers with no interest in defending the superior conditions of the registered dockworker. In fact it will break the near monopoly position the registered men now enjoy. As it is, the unregistered men are at best reluctant participants in the current docks strike.
The only way for the dockworker to retain his bargaining position is to use it now, to enforce traditional proportions and establish a veto ove all work movement.
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years imprisonment. His crime had been to organise the peasantry of La Convencion