Below is the text of the leaflet distributed by AWL members at the Respect Coalition-initiated "Organising for Fighting Unions" conference in London on Saturday 11 November.
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"WORKERS' CHARTER" IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH!
We need a movement of the membership across the trade unions:
• To resist, in alliance with service-users, and roll back the Government's agenda of privatisation, and win adequate funding of public services. Best quality health care and education, free for all, as a right, and 100% public ownership in public services, this time with democratic control. The right to retire at 60 on a living pension; restoration of the state pension's link to average earnings, at the 1979 level. Tax the rich to pay for expanded public services and pensions.
• To win the repeal of anti-trade union laws and legal recognition of the right to strike, to take solidarity action and to picket effectively. Union recognition, access to the workplace by union organisers, and effective redress against unfair dismissal, should be a legal right for every single unionised worker. Equal rights for agency workers. A living wage for all workers, including a minimum wage of at least 2/3 median male earnings. Bosses should be liable to criminal charges for corporate manslaughter.
• To rebuild strong and effective trade unionism in the workplaces, independent of the employers; win the right to union meetings in work time and union workplace representatives directly elected, in work time, by those whom they represent.
• To co-ordinate and deliver effective physical, financial, political and industrial solidarity with those in struggle.
• To champion trade union democracy based on control of the trade unions by the members themselves. All union representatives should be elected for a maximum two-year term of office and be subject to recall at any time. Full-time officials should be paid a wage set by the average among the workers they represent.
• To ensure union political funds are controlled by the unions' regular democratic structures, and used to further clear, democratically-controlled, working-class political representation.
These proposals are, of course, only an initial draft, covering some of the main issues of the class struggle. As a serious rank-and-file movement developed, it would broaden and enrich its platform. The draft "Workers' Charter" presented from the platform to this conference, however, unfortunately fails to get even to first base.
It is fairly wide-ranging, but on no point does it say anything to the left of official TUC policy. What is the point of a left-wing charter which is weaker than the official policy?
True, the TUC fails to fight for even its own policy. A left-wing rank-and-file movement could do good work just by fighting for the better trade-union policies which the top officials neglect or ignore.
But then the left-wing movement must insist on what is sharp and definite in the official policies, rather than what is vague. Most of the clauses in the draft Charter are vaguer than the official policies.
For example, the draft Charter calls only for "the right to campaign for the repeal of the anti-union laws" not for their actual repeal. It wants only "the right to strike in defence of our interests" - something Tony Blair and the Tories could agree with, in general - without spelling out that workers need the right to strike free from all the legal restrictions that currently exist.
"The right to a job at a living wage and time with our families and communities..."? Without definite measures to implement it, the "right to a job" is an empty wish. What about workers who do not have (or reject) family or "communal" attachments? Do they not have the right to leisure time? What "living wage" is proposed?
"The right to public control of all vital public service and utilities"? "Public control"? Regulation by an official agency is a form of public control, and the Blairites are all for it. What about public ownership? And, by the way, which public services and utilities does the Charter consider "vital", and which are the other ones for which not even public regulation is suggested?
"The right to decent public housing or to private housing without crippling mortgages and rents"? We guess that the drafters want the restoration or at least conservation of council housing. What is actually written is indistinguishable from the Blairite policy of requiring a bit of "social housing" in private developments.
The Charter is made worse by the clumsy literary device of posing everything as a matter of "the right" to do this or that. The drafters resumably want the actual repeal of the anti-union laws; but they write down only a call for the right to campaign for repeal.
"The right to express our personal identity"? So vague a phrase means almost nothing.
Worse, the previous record of Respect makes us fear that, under cover of words which most trade-unionists will take as general (if vague) opposition to sexism, racism, and homophobia, the organisers of Respect are seeking positive endorsement for such supposed "expressions of personal identity" as the hijab or the burqa.
The legal right to wear such garments is not in question; the need to oppose racism directed against Muslim people on the pretext of opposition to Islamic doctrine and institutions is urgent. But to present a religio-political uniform, designed to conceal women's individuality, as an expression of "personal identity", rather than of oppression, is false.
The Charter concludes by promising "to organise a Trade Union Solidarity delegation to Venezuela". But in solidarity with whom? The Venezuelan workers or Chavez's government? They are not the same thing!
The Charter is not an adequate starting point. If trade unionists are to organise effectively, we need policies which, even if initially they cover a limited range, are sharp enough to organise round in the class struggle.
WHY NO CRECHE AT THE CONFERENCE?
There is no creche at this conference - putting Respect well behind the best practice of most of the trade union movement. Inevitably, those who suffer most will women workers. However, given the weak line that Respect has taken ont he fight for equality and women's liberation more generally the decision is not entirely surprising.
SUPPORT THE IRAQI UNIONS!
Workers' Liberty is proud to support the Iraqi workers' movement against both the imperialist US/UK occupation and the right-wing Islamist militias of the "resistance". For more information on Iraqi workers' struggles and how we can make solidarity with Iraqi trade unionists, visit www.iraqunionsolidarity.org
ALLIANCE WITH "LEFT" BUREAUCRATS OR RANK-AND-FILE MOVEMENT?
The decision to organise the "Organising for Fighting Unions" conference seems like a welcome turn by Respect towards the organised working class. However, in the unions Respect has not focused on or been a force for building the class struggle.
The recent UCU Left conference, which was organised in large part by SWP and other Respect supporters, was dominated by the issues of Iraq and the "all important" boycott of Israel - despite being held in the midst of a ballot over the union leadership's sell out on pay. There has been a similar approach in a number of other unions too.
It is vital that rank-and-file union activists have an understanding of wider political issues, but when we face acute problems such as low pay, attacks on pensions and privatisation, surely these should dominate the discussions.
In order to build Respect as a - not very left-wing or principled - electoral alternative to New Labour, the SWP et al seem prepared to jettison the basics of how socialists should operate in unions.
In Unison they say very little about the pensions sell-out, remain loyal to the union leadership over strategy for fighting NHS cuts and new attacks on the pension scheme. They argue that the left should concentrate on being the “best fighters for the leadership strategy”. A perspective of organising the rank-and-file isn’t just absent but rejected.
So when this conference talks of “Organising for Fighting Unions”, who are Respect seeking to organise? It would appear to be “friendly” bureaucrats. If you can’t relate to the membership you’ll try your best to cosy up to the “leaders”, hoping to get them to ally with Respect.
Again, the problem with this approach is indicated clearly by the issue of pensions. Respect is keen to maintain the support of PCS General Secretary Mark Serwotka who not only signed up to but took a leading role in the pensions sell out with other public sector unions. Two members of the SWP on the PCS executive voted with Serwotka and the Socialist Party for the sell out. (The only vote against came from Workers' Liberty supporter John Moloney.)
We should not hold back from reminding everyone we can that these union "leaders" defused what would have been the biggest strike since 1926 — a movement that could have done a lot to transform trade unions into “fighting organisations”.
The trade-union left should argue for policy that admits the mistakes, commits the unions to strike action in the event of inevitable future attacks and maintains a perspective of reversing the current situation. But how will that go down with the top table at this conference?
We need rank-and-file organisations uniting union members, stewards, reps and elected local officers into a force capable of arguing for, influencing and winning actions against employers and the government. Without such a force we limit ourselves to becoming advocates for the timid organisational approach of union leaders and apologists for bad policy. Respect's approach of seeking of using the unions as a recruiting around while compromising on the class struggle to keep in with union leaders is no substitute.
GEORGE GALLOWAY OR JOHN MCDONNELL
Workers' Liberty supports John McDonnell's campaign for leadership of the Labour Party - not because we think Labour can be "reclaimed", but because we want the unions to use every foothold they can find to fight the Blairites and lay the ground for the creation of a new working-class party. The approach of demanding immediate disaffiliation, without a fight, would lead to a less, not more, politically assertive workers' movement.
We also think it is worth comparing the record of John McDonnell to that of Respect figurehead George Galloway. We have disagreements with McDonnell, but he has consistently acted as a working-class representative and ally of the working class in struggle. He is by far the most rebellious Labour MP and has given a lead on issues from the Trade Union Freedom Bill to launching the Public Services Not Private Profit campaign. He has used his position to consistently support workers fighting back, from Gate Gourmet to the Merseyside Firefighters.
Contrast George Galloway, a middle-of-the-road Labour careerist and longstanding apologist for the likes of Saddam Hussein who, until he reinvented himself as an anti-war activist, was quite happy to go along with the Blairites on everything from freedom of information to tuition fees. Far from trying to represent the working class in politics, he says that he cannot live on less than £150,000 a year.
Galloway on himself: “If newspaper critics had focused on the incongruity of a left-wing campaigner obtaining support for his campaigning organisations from semi-feudal monarchies and businessmen...that would have been a legitimate line of attack, though my defence would have been that needs must.”
Since being elected in Bethnal Green he has acted as New Labour's only parliamentary ally in favour of a bill extending the blasphemy laws, and put his name to a motion promoting the limitation of abortion rights. Doesn’t all this tell you something about what Respect is?
WORKERS' LIBERTY
The Alliance for Workers' Liberty is an organisation of activists fighting for a labour movement capable of overthrowing capitalism and winning socialism. We stand for independent working-class politics in every sphere of struggle, and against the cross-class populist politics of Respect. To find out more ring 020 7207 3997, email office@workersliberty.org or visit www.workersliberty.org
