scheme. For example, workers" organisations, in albance with housewives and consumer committees, should collect and assess the information necessaty for the compiling of a price index that will take into account the effect of price rises on families of different sizes and with different incomes, local variations in proes, etc.
The method of compensation would have to provide workers on lower wages or with large famibes, with extra compensation to allow for the effects of taxation, loss of social security benefits, ete, The scale should apply to take home pay, not basic rates, and thus increase bonus and overtime earnings automatically.
VIGILANCE COMMITTEES To cover all possible situations, any worker by the Board numbers, Sir Frank Figgures of the Pay Board, and Sir John Donaldson of the NIRC. The latest breakdown in the supply of information shows clearly the degree to which the Gov Government's prices policy depends on the voluntary co-operation of the capitalists. The cap italists could decide collectively to refuse to collaborate with the Commission and get away with it. They have successfully boycotted other state bodies in the past. But such action now would reduce to nil the chances of the Govern ment gesting a deal with the TUC. So a large proportion of the capitalists are simply going slow, or else ignoring the Commission altogethThis is just one more illustration that the only people who can be relied on to take effective action against rising prices are those who stand to lose most by them, the working class, pioneered by the niners, building workers and Chrysler workers, and the mass picket as it was used at Saltley. In preparation for this, any attempt to enforce the laws against picketing must be blocked now.
protected from inflation, Claims such as these would be dealt with by workers" vigilance committees set up in every factory to enforce the slding scale. Such committees would also organise tegular and systematic checks to make sure that no wearing down of living standards was taking place unnoticed, and to ensure that the bosses were carrying out the terms of the sliding scale properly and following all the rulings of the vigilance committee.
Demunds such as these could be fought for and won in an individual trade union struggle. But there is a danger that if only a few of the most powerfully organised sectors of the trade union movement won such a concession, the overall rate of inflation would be pushed up while the vast majorty of the population remained unprotected. Any such victory must therefore be seen as simply the opening round of an all-out united strugale to win this protection for all the victims of capitalism workers, unemployed, pensioners, students, etc. The sliding scale must be applied not only to all wages and salaries, but to all state benefits as well.
GENERAL STRIKE In the struggles that lie ahead in the next year there is a real possibility of such a demand being fought for. Some of the biggest battalions of the working class — the miners and the engneers - will be in conflict with the Government. A militant struggle by either of These groups would spark off a wave of mass solidarity throughout the working class.
Such a movement could be rapidly turned into a real, united fight for working class interests -• general strike, The first aim of a general strike under these circumstances would be to bring the Tory Government down, but it would also be an important means of fighting for particular solutions to the most important problems facing the working class, Demands for a reduction in the work week, a big all-round increase in wages, etc. would Outside Pentonville Prison last year — mass mobilisation of the working class made a mockery of the law That can only be done hy mobilising a main IDovement throughout the trade unions in defence of picketing. Every picket who finds himself treatened by the police, the courts, or private good squads, should be able to count on such a set of demands.
PREPARATIONS PRACTICAL MEASURES the hacking of such a movement.
undoubtedly be put forward. The demand for a sliding scale to protect all sources of income from inflation would be an important part of country.
The sincerity of all those who claim to speak for the working class - the trade union leadership, the TUC, the Labour Party - can be tested by their willingness to take up the crucial task facing the working class movement: the need to prepare practically for a general strike against the Tory Government. But militants should not wait for these bodies to move before making such preparations.
Important steps can be made immediately:
passing motions of full support for the engineen" and miners' struggle through all trade anion bodies, setting up of local delegate bodies to organisc solidarity with whichever group goes into struggle against the Government first. An part of such prepuration, demands like those being put forward in the engineering claim, and the demand for a sliding scale lo protect all sources of income from inflation, should be discussed and popularised throughout the working class movement, As we base said, however, the most direct and effective way of dealing with inflation would he by workers control of prices. It is quite possible for the trade union movement today to launch specific struggles which could lead the working class movement in this direction.
The first practical thing which needs to he done i to draw up a plan of industrial action in selected companies and industries, particularly those associated with the production of essential consumer goods. House wives" organisstions, and price committees set up by Trades Councils, should supply the trade unions with information concerning the particular goods or brands of goods which are most casential and which are rising in price. Action should then be taken against the manufacturers, with the aim of fording them to freeze their prices. A special fund should be set up by the trade But the first task is to organise the broadest possible forces within the labour movement to smash the ruling class attack on the North Wales building workers coming up for trial in lines. unions to provide full strike pay for workers engaged in these actions. Such a move wouk gain the overwhelming support of every worker, housewife and pensioner in the Workers and house wives, organised at the point of distribution, would be able to check up on prices, ensuring that no company could get away with breaking an agreement, and that no chain store could keep up its prices while pocketing the differenoe for itself. These measures are thoroughly practical They expose the falseness of the claim that only the Government and the civil service can control prices. Such actions as these would have an immediate effect and would set in motion a process of struagle leading to more thorough and effective solutions to the problem of rising prices such as workers' control of prices UNITY IN STRUGGLE - If the Labour Party is serious in its claim to stand for the interests of the working class then it should declare its intent to impose a sliding scale for all inconcs by low when it comes into power. It shouki place all its facities at the disposal of bouse wives and workers organisations today in order that the fight to force prices down can be better co-ordinated.
Struggles on the question of prices, and the setting up of organisations to collect information and co-ordinate such struggles, can be an important way of bringing large numbers of people into the fight against the boases and against the Tory Government, It can draw in both sections of workers who are not yet putting forward wage claims, and groups not usually directly involved in trade union strug gles: housewives, pensioners, small traders, students. If a mass, well organised movement on the question of prices grows up at the same time as the engineers or the miners confront the Government on the wages foont, then the Tones will find themselves completely Bolated and the strength of the working class movement will be unbeatable.
Shrewsbury this October. A victory in Shrews bury will be a major step towards making sure that no further attempte are made by the ruling class to use the courts against trade union picket Red Weekly 17 August 1973 Page 5
ruling classes were forced to make important politicai turns, If it wus a case of doing a deal with the trade union bureaucracies then the traditional parties of the ruling class, the Tories and their European counterparts, were strong state of the reinforcement of an exiting one.
The turn to open re pression by the European ruling classes can be seen at every level. In