well short of our E300 Fighting Fund tar get.
This is understandable in view of the pause in our publishing schedule. However, we still had to meet the same expenses during that fortnight, and the money has to come from somewhere.
The final total last month was E227. We must have a big effort this time to make sure the Fund goes over the top - to make sure we can carry on improving the quality of your paper. TUC President, Joe Crawford, of the Colliery Deputies union: "Trade unionists know better than anyone that they have to shape their ambitions within the context of the economic situation. They do not live in ignorance of the balance of payments, world trade, or the state of the pound." In other words, it's capitalism first-only then can a few crumbs be negotiated for the working class. No wonder that the TUC should show such little interest in actually leading struggles. After all, what would that do to "the balance of payments, world trade or the state of the pound"?
The management of the Adwest Group are still trying to convince everybody that the sit-in occupation at Adwest Engineering (Reading) is the result of a simple misunderstanding. Yet at the same time, they are already trying to transfer the most important part of the production work from Reading to their new factory in Pennywell, Sunderland, and are investigating a second site in the docks area of Sunderland to help accommodate further production work moved from Reading. Since they are so clearly aiming to cease all production at the Reading factory, why are uncy so anxious to convance every one thal there is no danger to jobs?
MANAGEMENT STRATEGY The Adwest Group has a very high rate of profit. Their latest figures show a return of 23.9% on capital invested, and they claim it's still rising.
They have achieved this high rate of exploitation by fragmenting their workforce into no less than 21 different subsidiaries with different names, individual plant bargaining, and intensi ve use of work study, job evaluation and other management techniques for introducing The last twelve months have seen industrial closure speed-up.
Naturally their response to the seizure of one of their factories and the demands put forward in the sit-in is tempered by their desire to preserve the situation in which they can make such profits. So the thought uppermost in their minds is to avoid the sort of sharp confrontation over redundancies which could serve to unite the workers of the whole combine in solidarity with the Reading workers An example of the danger which threatens them was the way Bowden Controls, their subsidiary in Llanelli which had its own sit-in dispute over a pay claim only 3 months ago, sent representatives to the Reading sit-in as soon as it began and not only pledged support but also called for the setting up of a combine shop stewards committee for the whole Adwest Group - something unheard of before It follows that the kind of agreement they would like is one in which the unions abandon the principled defence of jobs. For there are two ways of meeting the threat of redundancy: you can either accept the redundancies and just fight for the "best possible' redundancy payments, or you fight the redundancies themselves. The first alternative isolates the workers concerned into a sectional struggle. Therefore it achieves nothing as far as strengthening the organisation and confidence of the working class movement is concerned. It also seldom produces the goods even for those made redundant.
The Strike Committee has correctly taken up the second alternative. They are fighting the threatened shut-down of production and have seized the plant as a bargaining counter in the negotiations on that issue.
But to win, they must use every opportunity which fighting on this principled issue affords take the fight into the car industry itself. To win, they must forge firm links with shop stewards and staff representatives in other threatened industries in Reading so that together they can mobilise support throughout the local trade union movement.
To win, they must have the support and backing of workers throughout the car industry, where production is already being affected by the ES DULe. Paul Hunter Donations and messages of support should be sent to: Adwest Strike Committee, Adwest Engineering Ltd,, Headley Road East, Woodley, Reading. In its latest report last week the capitalists most reliable economie snothsayer, the National Institute Economic Review, predicts that even if the Phase 2 wage control laws could be maintained, the rate of inflation in the coming year would remain at its present unprecedented level of 10 per cent.
The immediate need of the working class therefore, to protect itself against the rapid destruction of the purchasing power of its wages, is becoming more compelling than ever. This destruction is not some accidental result of an inflation washed onto our shores from overseas; it is central to the Tory Government's strategy to deal with the mounting capitalist crisis.