A member of Women's Liberation in Manchester was arrested last Friday during a turther mass picket outside the Salford Electrical Instruments factory, where clesical workers are still on strike for a rise of El + 4% and a reduction by onethitd of the male/female differential. The first sign of trouble came when the senior police officer present, an Inspector Swithen anik, told the union official (APEA organises Ian McLean) that the picker line was illegal and constituted 'hatassment. The picket, he: said, could only try to persuade the scabs (production warkers) not to go in. McLean replied that in that case the inspector should send the scabs through one by one, so that the picketers had an adequate opportunity to attempt peacoTul persuasion.
There was no immediate reaction until shortly before 8.00 am when some of the scabs, heartened by the bebaviour of the police on previous pickets, began to break through sections of the picket line. Simultaneously. Tan McLean was assaulted; one member of Women's Liberation had her glasses broken by a strny fist; and police jumped in and crushed some of the picketers agaist a gate, Moments later tney emerged drapeing with them Sheila Cohen, a member of Women's Liberation, who bad brought her three year old son along for some basic education.
Later that morning she was charged with assaulting Inspector Swithenbank in the execution of his duty and remanded until 17 August. Strangely enough, a man who repeatedly threatened to assaut one or ene pickers was bot aures ted tor threatenine behavour hit merely moved Meanwhile, after seven weeks of strike action, management are offering increases of 40p to 90p. At first they denied that equal pay had anytbing to do with the claim, but they have now conceded the principle'. In other words, the claim does concern the reduction of the male female differential, and they are talking about men and women doing the same jobs bur at different rates of pay.
Red Weekly 20 July 1973 Page 2 ution Bill...is merely a redecorated version of the undemocratic partitionist settlement of 50 years igo. So a former internee, Paddy Joe MoClean, told over 250 people on a demonstration in London organised by the Irish Civil Rights Association (ICRA) last Sunday.
The march was supported by the Anti-Internment League, Clann na h Eireann, the international Marxist Group, the Belfast 10 Defence Committee, People's Democracy and the British Withdrawal from Northern Ireland Movement. Other speakers included Mrs. Edwina Stewart, Secretary of NICRA and a leading member of the Communist Party of Ireland. She, unfortunately, simply repeated the wellwarn formula that what was needed was the institutionalisation of democracy: This despite the fact that if the last five years have shown anything it is that any movement for democratic reforms Inevitably challenges the whole sectarian basis of the Orange State, and therefore any talk of a democratic state is illusionary. Also among the speakers was Bob Purdie, rational organiser of the AlL. He concluded by saying that:
When the Whitelaw settlement collapses, and the irish problem confronts the British people once more, those who told them that it could be solved by military intervention will have been discredited. The demand for the withdrawal of British troops will become irresistible. "Here in Britain the Irish organisations and the British left must turn their attention from a coo- fibres and food. cern solely with what the British war is doing to Ireland, and see what the Irish war is doing to British society. If we throw our weight behind the demand for troop withdrawals we can ensure that there is a growing realisation in Britain that the conflict in Ireland is a result of British imperialism's intervention, and can only be solved by a total British withdrawal, and self-determination for the Irish people.
Phota: Mike Nawion (Hed Weekly) MONETARY CRISIS it for.
NOT THE FIRST Rowntrees are not the first dealers to be caught out recently in the cocca market. And, since other commodity markets are behaving in the same way, they will not be the last firm to be hit by the same problems.
Viewed in relation to any time period the 100 percent rise in commodity prices in the last 15 months is phenomenal. It is now close to surpasing the famous Korean inflation of 1949-51. When that inflation ended, prices remained fairly stable until 1964 when there was a surge in metal (but not other) prices which collapsed in the world-wide economic recession of 1970-71. What distingulabes the present runaway inflation is that it includes almost all the major commodities - metals There are three causes of the present price boom Leist important is the emergence of certain specifie shortages in foods because of bad world harvests last year, and in metals because of factors such as the recent copper workers' strike in Chile. A second cause is the tupid increase in demond for row materials produced by the present economie upturn in nearly al the major capitalist countries, combined with a shortage of productive capacity resulting from the abandonment of expansion plans in the producing countries during the recession of 1970-71.
If these were the only causes then Rowntrees' gamble might have paid off. They lost their £20 million through ignoring the thind most important cause - the world monetary crisis. This has meant a monumental fiow of speculative funds into commodifies as a protection against general inflation, which is producing a general decline in confidence in paper money. Most of this move of course is out of the sickest currencies, dollars and pounds. The subsequent effect of this speculation is to worsen the posicion of these weak curren. cies even further, so that the process feeds off Itsell. Because the pound and dollar are being rapidly devalued relative to other currencies, the overall inflation of commodity prices is magnified in Britain and the US. For instance, - in the last six months tbe price of copper in Britain has doubled; in Switzerland it has only risen by one third. As a result the British trade balance suffers a tremendous trade deficit (lasc month's remained terrible at El 35 million) and costs of industrial raw materials and of tood are going up tascer than anywhere ebe.
As yet there is no sign of any break in the commodity inflation. But all speculative intlations have to end; and normaily they do so rapidly and produce elfects which will make Rowntrees' lost E20 million look like a dropp ed penny. Michael Price
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