Re: Reactionary petty-bourgeois strikes?

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

(From Ted Grant's In Defense of Marxism website -- http://www.marxist.com)

The Petrol Strike Brings Britain to a Standstill - Militancy Pays

By Phil Mitchinson, September 13, 2000

What an answer to all the cynics. In a matter of days a magnificent and
largely spontaneous movement of truck drivers, farmers and cabbies has
brought large parts of the country to a virtual standstill. This movement
represents the biggest national unofficial strike action seen in Britain
for decades. The ruling class are quaking in their boots. The leaders of
the TUC meeting in Glasgow meanwhile are oblivious to the real meaning of
the movement. In reality the union leaders were caught totally off guard.
Bill Morris for example writing in the Sunday Times Magazine (10/9/00)
comments that he always listens to the Farming programme on Radio 4 early
in the morning in order to keep in touch with the issues affecting the
40,000 agricultural workers who are members of the Transport and General
Workers Union. He evidently missed the episode discussing the effects of
petrol prices. Labour's Scottish Secretary John Reid meanwhile confidently
announced that Britain would not copy France because "the people of this
country do not resort to the French way of doing things." The myth of a
calm and peaceful society at ease with itself in Blair's new Britain has
been shattered.

Never again Blair told us would there be a winter of discontent. That was
Old Labour. In some parts of the country today there is rubbish left
uncollected in the streets, no fresh food in the shops, ambulances
restricted to 999 services and mile long queues outside the one petrol
station with supplies for sale. Such crises are not caused by Old Labour or
new, but by capitalism and the failure of Labour leaders to break with the
market and adopt bold socialist solutions. The TV news and, shamefully,
Labour politicians are claiming the movement is endangering peoples lives,
and that pickets are using violent means to intimidate drivers. This is
utter nonsense. Firstly from the beginning the lorry drivers and those
blockading the refineries have been in favour of allowing essential
supplies for the emergency services to get through. The drivers themselves
are refusing to cross picket lines not out of fear but out of support for
the movement.

The immediate cause of the protests is the steeply rising price of petrol.
Small farmers, road hauliers and taxi drivers are particularly affected by
this. Seeing the movement in France they promptly followed suit. However,
the movement didn't simply fall from a clear blue sky. There have been
protests staged and organisations mushrooming up over the last two years.
The press however ignored them, so they went largely unnoticed. Indeed even
at the beginning of this movement in Britain the right wing press were
still busily spewing forth their usual attacks on the French for "spoiling"
British holidaymakers' journeys, only suddenly and belatedly realising that
once the movement started here it had widespread support which they would
need to opportunistically tail end.

This is not a usually militant section of the population. Some are small
business people, some middle class. Many are self employed, although these
days, of course, many self employed people are just workers on contracts
rather than properly employed. Drivers in the big haulage firms are not
only workers but they are also unionised. However, they are all working
people, in many cases with their futures precariously balanced, their
livelihoods invested in a rig, a small piece of land or a cab. They are at
the immediate mercy of the vagaries of the world market, the power of the
monopolies and the policies of the government. The petrol price and tax
rises literally threaten to destroy them. For many this is the first time
they have ever been involved in any kind of protest. Clearly a line in the
sand has been crossed. At the same time they have provided us with a
glimpse of the power of the working class, so prematurely written off by so
many 'experts.'

Farmers in particular are not usually seen as militant. Yet they are being
forced to draw conclusions from their struggle to survive in a world
dominated by big monopolies. One such figure interviewed on TV was told by
the reporter that his protest was like the miners' strike. The farmer
agreed, pointing out that he hadn't supported the miners at the time, but
that in hindsight "Arthur Scargill was right. They were defending their
industry, now we're defending ours." The problem for small or even medium
size farmers, for independent haulers and so on is that there is no way
they can compete against the power of the monopolies. In reality, their
problems cannot be solved by capitalism any more than the workers' problems
can. Therefore they are natural allies. The only forces these people can
rely on are those of the working class, and the only secure future lies in
the struggle for a socialist society.

That such a small section of the population can bring the country to a
virtual standstill is proof of the power of militancy. Imagine then the
power of the organised working class. Imagine what the TUC could achieve
were the leadership to raise their little finger. Yet nothing terrifies
union bureaucrats more than militancy, and the threat it poses to their
comfortable lifestyles.

The rise in petrol prices has two main causes. Firstly there is the
reliance of Blair and co. on indirect taxation to raise funds. This
universal tax is grossly unfair having a hugely disproportionate impact on
poorer workers than on rich fat cats. These tax rises have been covered
with the veneer of trying to cut car usage to protect the environment. In
the first place the privatisation, deregulation and consequent destruction
of the public transport system forces people to use their cars. Secondly
the real polluters are big business, and heavy industry. The answer to that
isn't to go back to living in the dark ages as the Greens would have it. It
requires democratic control, investment in research and cleaning up
manufacturing. All that costs money, money the profit hungry capitalists
are not willing to spend. In the end the only answer lies in ownership and
planning, in other words a socialist solution. To tax petrol more and more
is simply to tax workers, while letting the real spoilers of the planet
carry on unhindered.

At the same time Blair blames the market. The market has forced up the
price of oil. In passing we note that when the price of oil was falling
there was no corresponding fall in the price of petrol as the monopolies
simply used their power to rake in more profits. Now Blair blames the
market for rising petrol prices. He has already blamed the market for job
losses, for Fords, for Rover, for the loss of jobs in shipbuilding. The
market is to blame for everything according to Blair. Of course, he's right
the market is to blame. Therefore it's about time the Labour government
broke with the market which is doing all this damage and introduced
socialist measures in the interests of all working people.

Instead of meeting with the protesters, Blair met with the privy council to
discuss the use of emergency powers, even the possible use of troops.
Blair, Straw and co. make disturbing noises about democratic rights. Lord
MacDonald said that obviously people have the right to protest but they
should not have the right to prevent the free flow of commerce and trade.
Surely that means the right to strike. Instead of defending the people who
elected them, ordinary workers, Blair and co. are doing the bidding of the
city of London and the big monopolies, in this case the oil companies, who
have made a sizeable profit out of the current crisis.

The widespread level of public support that this movement is getting
despite the obvious inconvenience it is causing, suggests that there is
something a little more profound here than a protest against fuel prices.
It is true that since almost everyone has a car, rising petrol prices
affects most people directly. At the same time everything is not as calm as
a superficial glance at the surface of society would indicate. There is a
simmering discontent just beneath this tranquil veneer. Disillusionment
with the actions of Blair and co., perhaps even a questioning of the very
system itself. This movement is not confined to Britain nor did it begin
here. It has spread like an oil slick across the continent. Protests have
spread across Italy, Belgium, Ireland and Germany. In Brussels 2,500 or so
truckers and taxi drivers protested on the tenth against a 50 percent rise
in diesel prices over the last 18 months. An oil refinery in Sicily has
been blockaded. Several towns across Germany have seen protests and
demonstrations. The movement began in France, of course. Whilst highly
unusual in this country, such protests have long been a tradition across
the channel. Beginning with the protests of the fishermen who won
significant gains, the movement spread to farmers, lorry drivers, ambulance
workers and others. With the widespread support of the population behind
them, the movement won an important victory. The government was forced to
back down. Above all it was not just the French example of militant action,
but the fact that their action was successful which has encouraged similar
movements across Europe. No doubt Blair is acutely aware that if the
movement in Britain is successful, then it can act as a spur to encourage
more militant action by workers facing attacks in every sector.

At the same time, it isn't possible to see these movements outside of the
context of the protests in recent years against the WTO, IMF etc. There is
a malaise in society being expressed in many countries in different ways.
The more traditional movement of the organised workers has been blocked by
their own leaders. Yet this discontent will always find an expression
somewhere. The initiative seen in the movement to date in Britain, the
blockades, the slow moving traffic, the pickets organised by mobile phone
are all a foretaste of future movements of the working class in general.

The methods being used are very much those of the workers. The blockade of
Shell's Stanlow terminal in Ellesmere Port in particular sounds like a
textbook example of workers' democracy in action. 100 or so farmers,
hauliers, taxi drivers, postal workers and even some unemployed people meet
to discuss which trucks can and cannot go out, which cases are emergencies
and which are not. They discuss and they vote. Incidentally what a mockery
this makes of the anti union laws. For years the union leaders have used
the threat of their use, sequestration and so on, to hold the movement
back. Where are the anti union laws now? There are mass pickets, unofficial
action. The anti union laws should be trampled underfoot by the organised
workers like the pieces of paper that they are. Labour leaders should not
be discussing new attacks on our rights they should be abolishing the
Tories' old ones.

Instead the union leaders are even more frightened than the government.
This is a golden opportunity for the unions. An immediate recruitment
campaign could draw these drivers and workers into the organised labour
movement. Instead Monks launches an attack on them. Bill Morris, suddenly
not so concerned with the issues facing his members in farming, goes so far
as to call for the arrest of the protesters. "This campaign has crossed the
line from democracy to anarchy. If they are breaking the law, the
protesters should be arrested," he commented at the TUC, while inside the
hall delegates were discussing training and partnership with business. A
layer of the middle class could be won over to the side of socialism, if
the unions were to rally behind this movement. However that would mean a
leadership willing and able to lead. In the long run through initiatives
like this inspirational movement the more traditionally militant workers
will take initiatives and create a new leadership too.

What about the left? They seem to be either in hiding or even worse
condemning the movement. Livingstone? The Mayor of London appears to be
more concerned with getting into Tony Blair's good books than supporting
this protest. The rump of what used to be the Communist Party, in an
attempt no doubt to not upset their friends the General Secretaries of the
trade unions, have condemned the movement and called for the end of the
blockade. Their comments reported in the Morning Star are simply echoes of
the remarks of UNISON's Rodney Bickerstaffe and Steve Pickering of the GMB.

Those who argued that the nature of the economy had fundamentally changed
because of the internet and globalisation should take note of what we are
seeing here. Oil still plays a decisive role in lubricating and fuelling
the economy. Without it, very much like the working class, nothing moves.
The price of oil has long had a major impact on developments in the world
economy. Those who today write it off as no longer relevant could be in for
a major shock. The present boom cannot continue indefinitely, and it could
well be an oil crisis that pushes the economy into a new slump.

Above all those who wrote off the working class will have to think again.
The power in the hands of ordinary working people has been demonstrated by
just a small and rather unexpected section of the population. Once the
majority of workers take such action no force on the planet could stop them.

To begin with we have to give full backing to the just demands of the
current movement, beginning with lower fuel prices. In the unions we must
condemn the response of Monks and co., and point out the need for
militancy. In the Labour Party at every level we must protest against the
actions of the government, and demand the following:

--Lower petrol prices. Labour must immediately remove the tax hikes they've
brought in since 1997. Tax the fat cat millionaires instead

--Nationalise the oil industry. Take ownership, management and control of
the oil industry out of the hands of the greedy monopolies and into the
hands of the workers

--For a socialist transport plan. Nationalise the railways the buses and
the big hauliers. For a fully integrated public transport system controlled
and managed by transport workers.

--A plan for freight to be drawn up democratically by transport workers and
lorry drivers in the interests of the workforce, the environment and
efficiency.

--Such a plan to form the core of a democratically drawn up and implemented
socialist plan of production.


Louis Proyect
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