The 1970s were a period of political questioning and reawakening. As capitalism’s post-war boom drew to a close the working class as a whole suddenly faced economic hardship and, increasingly, unemployment. For a critical minority from a new generation of working class youth, a whole panoply of questions was raised — from the nature of the USSR to the possibility or otherwise of the overthrow of capitalism. Now the evidence that capitalism, even with state protection, was still subject to economic crisis, and the reappearance of workers battling en masse in both the East and the West, sparked a wider political rethink. The formation of Revolutionary Perspectives, forerunner of the Communist Workers’ Organisation, was part of that. The following leaflet which we distributed in Glasgow in 1974 gives a flavour of the time.

The Social Con-Trick and Mass Strikes in Scotland

October saw an unprecedented wave of mass strikes in Scotland. Why did they erupt at this time?

Crisis of World Capitalism

Since 1968 capitalism has been facing a deepening crisis on a world scale. The collapse of profitability and increasing competition have led to endless numbers of bankruptcies with resulting unemployment: e.g. Rolls Royce, Aston Martin, Court Line, the Scottish Daily Express to name only a few British examples. At the same time inflation is at present running in excess of 15% in Britain. The working class is thus faced with increasing unemployment, plus a gradual reduction in living standards, with the longer term prospect of a massive slump and slide into another world war.

Throughout the world the ruling class has attempted to hold down working class resistance — from outright repression in state capitalist Poland, and by the junta in Chile, to enlisting the so-called ‘representatives’ of the working class, to try and moderate their wage demands: e.g. in Portugal.

The left-wing of capitalism in Britain, the Labour Party and the trades unions, are proving to be a cleverer enemy against the class than the Tories. These supposed representatives of the working class have come up with the ‘Social Contract’ as their latest move to make the workers accept cuts in their living standards. The recent upsurge of workers in Scotland in their struggle against the ‘Social Contract’ has again revealed the trades unions as not organs of the workers, but organs against them.

The Strikes

Resistance to the ‘Social Contract’ has been massive and widespread. The recent wave of unofficial strikes in Scotland has shown that workers have not been fooled by the manoeuvres of union officials like Jack Jones who went north to get the workers to honour the ‘Social Contract’ and defend the national interest, that is the interest of profit, which the unions will always defend.

With 35,000 workers on strike including Glasgow transport workers, Rolls Royce, teachers, Hoover, whisky bond workers, sewage and refuse workers in Glasgow and lorry drivers throughout central Scotland, and with another 100,000 laid off, for two weeks in October Scotland was approaching a general strike situation, in which the right wing capitalist groups (Tories, SNP) were calling for troops to smash the strikes.

All the strikers ignored the Labour Party’s ‘Social Contract’ and demanded £10-15 wage increases in an attempt to maintain living standards hit by inflation. But the strikes went further, in revealing in practice the real nature of the unions, and the interests of capitalism which they represent. All the strikes ignored union calls for a return to work. All the strikes created their own strike committees (though some remained dominated by the shop stewards organisation).

However, the bus workers rejected their stewards’ call for a return after two weeks, and the teachers formed their own independent Action Committee for the duration of the struggle.

It was the lorry drivers, however, who advanced furthest towards independent class activity. By electing a strike committee from the strikers themselves, which decided on distribution of supplies (e.g. medicine), by rotating the membership of the committee, by organising flying pickets through which the strikers were able to spread the struggle, the lorry drivers showed the capacity of today’s working class to organise themselves independently of any permanent organisation such as the unions, or stewards committees, which in the last analysis can only defend the sectional interests of ‘their own’ workers. This is an important lesson for the working class at this time of world economic crisis, when the only organisation which can represent it, and fight for its interests, are those that are formed when the need arises during struggle, but which disappear when that particular struggle is over.

The Way Ahead

The major limitation of the present strike wave, despite its militancy and self-confidence, was the failure of the various strike committees to unite across job frontiers. Despite the fact that all the strikes took place at the same time, in the same area, there was no attempt at any joint activity. This limitation can be explained by the present stage of the world crisis. Workers are only just beginning to realise that strikes for higher wages can only be a temporary solution to their problems. As the capitalist crisis bites deeper, and as inflation and unemployment take their toll, a new necessity for linking strike committees will emerge, since only in a period of open revolutionary struggle can there be permanent organisations of the working class. Finally, strike committees will have to be centralised into Workers’ Councils, through which the workers can begin to struggle, not for higher wages, but to strive for the abolition of wage slavery itself, and with it production for profit, building instead a world-wide community of production for human NEEDS.

In the Light of Time: Comments for Readers Today

The social con-trick in the title is our play on the term ‘Social Contract’ used by Harold Wilson’s recently elected Labour government to describe the ‘fair’ deal Labour was offering the working class, or at any rate, the TUC. In return for the repeal of the Conservatives’ 1971 Industrial Relations Act, plus food subsidies, and a freeze on rent increases (inflation was at a post-war high), trade union leaders agreed to cooperate with a programme of voluntary wage restraint.

In fact during the Sixties both Parties had had trouble trying to curb working class militancy over pay demands. Despite the high level of trade union membership, amongst full-time male workers at any rate, the unions had less than full control over their members. They were often running to catch up with a strike that was already underway in order to make it ‘official’. Barbara Castle’s white paper In Place of Strife with its stipulation that a strike must only take place after a trade union ballot, was quietly dropped by the previous Labour government. It was a ruling class measure ahead of its time. On coming to power in 1970, Ted Heath’s Conservative government proposed to rush through the Industrial Relations Act which displayed many of the hallmarks of today’s situation. It demanded state registration of unions who were now required by a ‘National Industrial Relations Court’ to use postal ballots and have a cooling-off period before a strike could begin. Otherwise the strike would be illegal, as would any unofficial or solidarity action by other workers. Moreover, without state registration a union could be sued by employers in the civil courts. This ham-fisted attempt to force the unions to exercise more control over their membership was no doubt hastened by the growing impact of strike action, itself a response to a further spike in inflation. (Which was approaching 7% and rising in 1970.) In July a two-week dockers’ strike had led to the queen announcing a state of emergency and the army being brought in to ensure food supplies (which the dockers in any case did not impede although imports and exports were severely reduced). A court of enquiry was conjured up and the dockers accepted a 7% pay rise which, in view of inflation, was an effective wage cut.

The draft Industrial Relations Bill was published at the beginning of December, just as power workers were beginning a work to rule which brought daily power cuts until mid-December. This was not in protest at the Bill and in fact the TUC was reluctant to do anything very much. It was largely due to pressure from the grassroots that the TUC was pushed into doing anything to oppose the Bill beyond behind the scenes manoeuvring. In the absence of a TUC call for an all-out strike, local demos were held soon after the Bill was published on 8 December 1970. Eventually, two months later, Vic Feather (TUC general secretary) addressed a huge demo united as one behind the memorable chant, “One, two, three, four, we don’t want no Tory law”. The Bill finally became law on 5 August 1971.

It was repealed three years later, but in the meantime the deeper question of what was happening to the working class as a whole, not just in Britain, and how to respond when faced with a worldwide economic crisis and the growing threat of unemployment, was reduced to a growing number but generally uncoordinated official or unofficial sectional disputes with no wider aim than their own jobs and pay packets. The fact is that despite the social con-trick millions of workers still had illusions about (Old) Labour: illusions which would be weakened by the factory closures and industrial shutdowns which accelerated under the Labour governments of the second half of the Seventies.

The failure of the strike wave to go beyond sectional boundaries was not only limited to Glasgow in 1974, this became the major drawback of the desperate struggles to come later in the 1970s right up until the last great struggle and defeat of the old industrial working class in Britain, the miners strike of 1984-5 which was deliberately fought in almost complete isolation by the NUM.

Unfortunately our optimistic scenario of the early Revolutionary Perspectives, that ‘as the capitalist crisis bites deeper, and as inflation and unemployment take their toll, a new necessity for linking strike committees will emerge’ did not materialise. We had a lot to learn. And not just about strike committees!

Aftermath

Fifty years on the world has changed. The USSR has long gone, though not all of the illusions about state control of the economy. China has become the world’s top exporter of consumer goods and is preparing to challenge the USA as the world’s strongest imperialist power. In the old capitalist heartlands the structure of the labour force has changed dramatically, especially in the UK where manufacturing and heavy industry have given way to a predominantly service economy. No longer does a predominantly manual workforce gather in relatively large workplaces and live cheek by jowl in the same working class communities. Back in the 1970s the trade unions had a much stronger hold over these workforces. But trade union membership declined steeply in the 1980s and 1990s, falling from 13 million in 1979 to around 7.3 million in 2000. At present the figure is around 6.4 million, or 22.4% of the workforce. The majority (3.5 million) are women. Meanwhile self-employment increased from 1979 onwards, to reach a record high of 15% of total employment in 2016. Similarly, in 1970, services accounted for 56% of the UK economy. Today service industries account for 81% of total UK economic output and 83% of employment. (Many are state employees.) At the same time, women and gay people have more legal rights.

Yet we all still live in a class society. Global capitalism, though rotten to the core, still survives by milking the unpaid labour power expended by us wage slaves. What’s more the same existential crisis that had started to dog capitalism in the 1970s is still with us — except that today it is much, much worse. Now there is no question that the longer capitalism survives the greater the threat to the very existence of the planet, whether from the knock-on effects of global warming and environmental damage or the more immediate threat of imperialist war engulfing the planet. The big question now is whether the world working class can sink its differences and recognise the potential of its own collective power to overthrow the whole wages and profit system. Above all, the global working class needs to embark on a revolutionary political path: a path which was started by the revolutionaries of yesteryear and which those of us today, such as our Internationalist Communist Tendency, are attempting to signpost more clearly.

Timeline

1970
December: strikes in Gdansk, Poland, spread to Baltic ports after the government raises food, fuel and clothing prices.

1971
January: Lord Robens resigns from chair of the National Coal Board in protest at plans to sell off parts of nationalised industries.
8th: UK postal workers strike starts (ends March 20th:)
February: 1st-31st March, tens of thousands of Ford car workers strike for higher pay.
April: unemployment reaches, 3% — highest since 1940
August: 8th, Industrial Relations Act comes into law
September: TUC Congress resolves to instruct unions to boycott the NIRC and the registration requirement entirely.

1972
January: Unemployment over 1 million.
February: 9th — 28th. First national miners’ strike since 1926 called by the National Executive Committee of the NUM. State of emergency declared. Prime Minister Ted Heath imposes a three-day week. Strike ends when the miners accept an improved pay offer in a ballot.
April: TGWU dock workers accused of refusing to work on container lorries of two haulage companies in Liverpool. The National Industrial Relations Court imposes a permanent ban on "blacking" by Liverpool dock workers and the TGWU fined £5,000 and then £50,00 which it ignores.
June-September: building workers’ strike copied the miners’ flying pickets until 200,000 were on strike. Five months after the strike ended the Shrewsbury 24 were arrested and prosecuted for unlawful assembly and conspiracy to intimidate. It wasn’t until 2021 that the Court of Appeal overturned the convictions.
July: 21st: Five dockers arrested after refusing an order to stop blacking the Midland Cold Storage Depot in Stratford. This triggered an immediate nationwide strike of 170,000 dockers, with thousands of workers from other unions joining a mass demo toward Pentonville Prison where Bernie Steer, Derek Watkins, Tony Merrick, Conny Clancy, and Vic Turner were being held. Demonstrators at the prison commandeered two buses and a freight semitruck to blockade its entrance. The TUC was moved to threaten a twenty-four-hour general strike. The Five dockworkers werer released after only four days. Nevertheless, from 28 July to 16 August there was a nationwide dock strike over containerisation (necessary precursor to globalisation) after the union rejected the ‘Jones-Aldington proposals’ to ease unemployment resulting from ‘containerisation’.

1973
January: creation of Pay Board and Prices Commission (Heath)
April: hospital ancillary workers strike for higher pay
May: 1st : TUC one day protest strike against pay policies
September: 3rd: TUC expels 20 unions for registering under IRAct
October: 11 Arab states agree to cut oil production by 5% each month against US pro-Israel policy
November: 1st phase 3 of govt anti-inflation policy (prices and incomes policy?) limits pay rises to 7% p.wk
12th NUM begins overtime ban in protest over low pay offer
13th energy crisis induces govt to declare state of emergency
21st NUM rejects any pay deal under phase 3
29th petrol ration coupons begin to be distributed; 50mph speed limit; street lighting reduced
December: 6th Financial Times share index biggest fall since 1935; 12th train drivers overtime ban begins to be felt
13th the Three-Day Week announced for the United Kingdom by Edward Heath's Conservative government to conserve electricity, the generation of which was severely restricted due to action by coal miners and railway workers.

1974
January: From 1 January commercial users of electricity were limited to three consecutive days' consumption each week and prohibited from working longer hours on those days. Services deemed essential (e.g. hospitals, data centres, supermarkets and newspaper printing presses) were exempt. Television companies were required to cease broadcasting at 22:30 to conserve electricity, a restriction which was dropped after the election was called
14th: talks with TUC/NUM/PM break down
February: 7th: Heath calls general election for 28th Feb over “Who governs Britain?” urging voters to decide whether it was the government or the unions which ran Britain.
10th: NUM begins all-out strike for 30-40% pay rise
17th: Harold Wilson announces plan for ‘the social contract’ between Labour and the TUC whereby Lab will introduce social legislation in return for wage restraint.
26th: CBI (Confederation of British Industry) calls for repeal of IRA
28th: general election resulted in a hung parliament, in which the Conservatives had the most votes but Labour had the most seats.
March: 5th: Wilson forms a minority Labour government
7th: Three-Day Week restrictions lifted
May: 1st: start of the Imperial Typewriters strike. See our article leftcom.org
September: 16th: Labour’s Trade Union and Labour Relations Act, the ‘social contract’ comes into force. In return for the repeal of 1971 Industrial Relations Act, food subsidies, and a freeze on rent increases, the Trade Union Congress assured it would cooperate with a programme of voluntary wage restraint. The social contract specified a 12-month interval between wage settlements to prevent repeated wage demands whilst specifying that wage increases should be confined either to compensating for inflation since the last settlement or for anticipated future price increases before the next settlement.

Following the Conservatives’ electoral losses Margaret Thatcher challenged Heath for leadership of the Conservative Party. Inflation in the UK peaked at around 25% in 1975. Unemployment continued to rise. An unemployment rate of 7% enabled the Conservatives and Thatcher to win the 1979 election under the slogan “Labour isn’t Working”. Not long afterwards afterwards (1984) unemployment under Thatcher was broaching 12%, its highest post-war level. (Today the rate is 4%.)