like other workers, are today facing a worsening situation -redundancy threats.
national campaign within the membership for the claim.
Only by campaigning for a joint struggle by NALGO members with other workers to defeat the Wilson leadership and its policies can the problems facing public service workers be lackied. roncies ror sucn a campaign were contained in many of the resoluuons put forward to the NALU AC tion Group conference on 18/19 October, as well as in the printed election manifesto of IMG candidates for the NAG Steering Committee - the only candidates wno Domerea to present a manuresto. buttie conterence cominated by the International Socialists, rejected these policies and instead voted for militant variations of the policies of the bureaucracy rus re ceton was very clear i Lo debate around pay and inmaton. number of militants, including IMG Members of the National and Local Government Officers Association, tinuing inflation. social spending cuts, the non-filling of vacant posts and The 1975 local government pay claim was defeated by the propaganda of the Labour leaders coupled with the manoeuvrings of the NALGO bureaucracy, aided by the left's failure to organise any members, put forward resolutions in Tavour or a suding scale or wages monthly increments to stop pay from lagging behind rising prices. policy would mean detending the ments or workers as a Dare mum to maintain teir living standards, ratner than paying for the capitalist crisis out of their own pockets. olution also included the demand for a Ll lat rate increase and a minimum Ware OLLYU Customary As has become customary, the Is argued against a sliding scale. ume tney did not use tner ume-worn 'militant motivation of past debates that workers could do better out of than they could from a sliding seale. Instead, borrowing from the repertoire of the bureaucracy, they reasoned that such a demand was 'unrealistic' and would not be supported by the rank and truth of the matter is that it is simple "militant demands which have been exposed as unrealistic by the rising rate of a two figure claim might have staked their claim as a 'militant'. But inflation had turned this vear's 25 per cent settle ment into a defeat. Thus both the burfile in June in the name of Wilson's ec onomic policy - and the IS -then demanus on me mood or ala! defeat instead of on the objective interests of the membership -with con- ingness of the membership to fight.
a pay policy which offers no solution wine oooose me to umit the conte ...outside the Government's limit. It refused to name any figure - although £15 was argued against as also being 'unrealistic an interim claim, though inflation has already taken £3 in real terms off the Such a average local government wage since the summer settlement.
An IMG resof the pay claim defeat - among them the need for a national political strategy by the left in the union - is already holding back the NAG from a decisive campaign on social expenditure cuts So far there have been some successful local actions against the non-filling of But this vacant posts, such as in Tower Hamlets. But there is a crying need to build nationwide action out or these local struggles.
Refusal Why this change in argument? The inflation. In the past anyone supporting working class.
- who betrayed the rank and who base - fall back onto arguments about realism' and the unwillThe conference thus ended up with ence called only for realistic pay claims..
-and will not fight for Unrealistic The refusal of IS to learn the lessons methods of revolutionaries.
SUCH SORRO HATE TE WECAD OU UCLUUCT