crucial stage reached The sit-in at Transport Equipment (Thornycroft) Ltd. - British Leyland's Basingstoke factory - is now entering its most crucial phase. With Eaton's due to take over the factory on 1 October, BLM are getting very worried that they won't have a factory to hand over to them. And with no gearboxes coming out of Thornycroft's the dispute is beginning to create supply problems for them in other parts of the combine as well. So over the last few weeks, BLMC have been trying a number of new tactics - with a little help from their friends: the local press, the Social Security, and of course Mr Stanley Orme, M. P. "A DRAMATIC APPEAL"
First there was what the Southern Evening ' Echo called a "dramatic appeal to Thornycroft workers from BLMC, not to be "misled into fighting other peoples imaginary battles for them". BLM were claiming that they now had sufficient "voluntary redundancies" to cover the 344 jobs they wanted to get rid of, so there was "no need" for the occupation to go on. The occupation committee replied that they wanted a thousand guaranteed jobs before they would hand over the factory plur severance pay from BLMC for workers being retained by Eatons if the deal went ahead.
The BLMC "appeal" contained a few very revealing phrases. Amongst other things, it said: "The Eaton Corporation has informed the unions of its willingness to engage some 700 men, the balance of the Thornycroft work force, at their existing rates and conditions of employment. Eaton has said that providing present market conditions do not deteriorate, no redundancy is anticipated during the rest of 1972 and throughout 1973. For such a period of time that Eatons can be expected to look ahead, job security is therefore reasonably assured". (Our emphasis). In other words, there will be no improvements in wages or conditions - in a factory where this year's National Engineering Wage Claim has not even been talked about, let alone met. But the statement is also quite open about the real reason for unemployment - "market conditions" - and just how uncertain the future of these "conditions" is - Eaton's can only be "expected" to be able to look ahead for fourteen months! "CONFRONTATION"
Meanwhile, the Social Security have been playing their usual strike-breaking role -despite the efforts of a couple of Thornycroft workers who have been acting as a strike claimants union, some families have been getting as little as E3 a week in supplementary benefit and one case was reported of only 90p being paid out by the S.S. So, not surprisingly, the wives have been getting pretty angry. A few have blamed their husbands for sitting in, which led to a press "confrontation between wives and the union men" story. But at a special meeting with occupation leaders only a handful of wives expressed discontent. Most support the sit-in despite the hardship.
MR. STANLEY ORME, M. P. Then finally there was Mr. Stanley Orme, Labour M. P. for Salford West - - the great knight in shining armour from the Trade Union Group of M. P.'s — who rushed down to Basingstoke a mere ten weeks after the sale and redundancies were first announced and five weeks after the seizure of the plant. And what was it that he breathlessly told the Thorycroft workers after his belated arrival on the scene? "I shall write to the Minister of Trade and Industry, Mr. John Davies, within the next few days. I think that to sell off this plant for only £5 million at the cost of 1,100 jobs is a'sad thing for British industry".
He had no strategy for struggle, of course -except for his pathetic letter to Davies. In fact, he made no mention of any kind of class struggle at all. After all, we are all British - even Lord Stokes. •In his own small way, Orme plays the same dirty role that the Morning Star and the "Communist" Party have played over Thornycroft's (see the last two issues of The Red Mole) - blurring over the class issues by talking about a "British Industry" as if it were some vast classless enterprise. Such patriotic verbiage is always pernicious, but never more so than when peddled by