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THE EVENTS OF JULY
(1) On 19th July, lorry drivers began picketing London's Royal group of docks and Tilbury container terminal to challenge what the drivers saw as the dockers' threat to their jobs. Socialist Worker, The Morning Star and Tribune reported that these drivers were paid for picketing by their employers (container firms) who had a vested interest in keeping their present workers on because paying dockers at a higher wage would mean less profits. Socialist Worker (29 July) quotes Walter Cunningham, Hull docker shop steward: "'Container work has always been dockers' work - It is only because the mass of dockers throughout the country have only now taken up the fight that the problem has got twisted around. Other workers have been allowed in the past to take these jobs and now everyone sees them as having a right to them ... In saying this, we have no fight against lorry drivers or any section of workers, but unfortunately there is no short term solution to the division among workers which is being used by the employers'". This position is representative of the three papers.
(2) The dockers continued and intensified their picketing of container depots. This led to one of the firms, Midland Cold Storage, taking 7 dockers to the National Industrial Relations Court (NIRC) which found in favour of Midland and granted an order restraining the 7 from picketing which was an Unfair Industrial Practice because it was intended to force the firm to dismiss its present employees and therefore went beyond the bounds of peaceful picketing. On 21st July, 5 of the 7 were jailed for contempt of court for refusing to obey the NIRC's orders. The IR Act had made its first martyrs.
(3) The bourgeoisie had been doing its best to avoid this situation - knowing full well that the political consciousness of the working class meant that it would stand out in solidarity with any of its number who were imprisoned. The Jones-Aldington Committee [1] on the docks had been working flat out to produce an interim report before the Midland case escalated and the Financial Times had stated on l8th July "In fact it seems unlikely that the seven men will face the risk of imprisonment immediately - perhaps leaving time for the major national issue to be resolved ... On Thursday the NIRC could decide not to take direct action against the men but simply to issue a judgement on disobedience of its orders."
[1] Jack Jones, General Secretary of the TGWU and Toby Low, First Baron Aldington, Chairman of the Port of London Authority and co-chairman with Jones of the joint special committee on the ports industry. In a different context, Low had been implicated in 'Operation Keelhaul' after World War II, to repatriate Soviet citizens (including many who did not wish to be repatriated) in exchange for the repatriation of Western Europeans who found themselves in Soviet hands. Aldington launched a famous libel suit agains the writer Nikolai Tolstoy, who had accused him of war crimes. Tolstoy had the support of Alexander Solhenitsyn.
In the event, the NIRC's sense of duty to the rule of law outweighed its intended function under the Act: "Sir John Donaldson, NIRC president, in making the committal order ... said ... The purpose of the NIRC was to promote good industrial relations and none of its members imagined for one moment that the making of a committal order would achieve this result. But the issue was far greater even than good industrial relations. 'The public at large through a properly elected Parliament has set up the Industrial Court. It has given this court the power and duty of protecting the rights of all workers, unions and employers in accordance with the law. The issue is whether these men are to be allowed to opt out of the rule of law. Can they pick and choose, relying upon it for their protection of their homes and families but rejecting it when, even temporarily, it obstructs their industrial objectives.'" (FT, 22.7.72)
(4) The Unofficial General Strike
As a result of the 5's imprisonment, the unofficial national docks shop stewards committee called a national dock strike. Other sections of the working class came out on strike in support - notably, the lorry drivers who had previously been picketing the docks, the workers at Midland Cold Storage, the print workers (first in London and later in Manchester), some miners in Scotland, South Wales and Yorkshire. London busmen had a one day strike as did some engineering firms (though because it was the holiday period for most car and engineering firms, there was relatively less opportunity to express solidarity.)
Making It Official
The trade union leaders made no attempt to lead; they rather adequately represented the position of their membership in voting at the TUC General Council meeting on 26th July to call a one day official general strike for the release of the 5. Victor Feather was asked on 25th July whether he would advise the 5 to apologise to the court and thus purge their contempt. He replied that he would not advise them to do anything; but, that he knew if he were in prison like them he would never apologise to the court. He was then asked if the TUC would call for a return to work if the 5 were released. He replied that no, the TUC would issue no such call; but that the workers would return to work because the men's release was the object of the strikes. The General Secretary of the TUC was clear that neither he nor the TUC had authority to wield over the working class once it had taken a stand and that his only function was to speak for the class as a typical member of it - to put its case to the nation. The General Council did not call a General Strike against the IR Act because that was not the stand the working class had taken. The dockers shop stewards committee did not call for a strike against the Act.
What Vic Feather and the General Council did when they called a one day General Strike was to make the existing unofficial General Strike official. Even though, as the Government stated, only 170,000 workers were actually on strike, an unofficial [general? - PB] strike existed. The number of workers taking decisions to strike was daily increasing; and when the engineering holidays had concluded, if the 5 had still been in prison, there would certainly have been a full engineering strike. There was nowhere to be seen a movement against the strikers - no organisation of volunteers to run essential services etc. Indeed, the lesson of 1926 had been learnt by the bourgeoisie and petty-bourgeoisie - insisting on maintaining essential services is not the point - the point is to make the concessions necessary to get workers back to work. Television reporters, the Financial Times and Daily Mirror were unanimous in describing it as the worst, most serious crisis since 1926 thereby according it the same status as the official General Strike then.
(5) The Labour Party reacted in two ways. First, its left and right took up positions. Reg Prentice, Shadow Employment Minister, for the right, stated "They (the imprisoned 5) are absolutely wrong to organise picketing and blacking which has not got the support of their union. They are even more wrong to defy the order of the court....Trade unionists should not rally round these men as though they are latter-day Tolpuddle martyrs." (FT, 22.7.72). Wedgwood-Benn for the left: "likened the plight of the dockers who have been sent to jail to the spirit of the six Dorset men (Tolpuddle martyrs). . .'Millions of people in Britain whatever they may think of the rights and wrongs of the dockers' actions will in their hearts respect men who would rather go to jail than betray what they believe to be their duty to their fellow-workers and the principles which they hold ... The law which has put these men in prison is an evil law, drawn up by a government which hates the trade unions...'" (Sunday Times, 23.7.72).
Secondly, Wilson spoke for the Party as a whole when he said to the Government, I told you so; the Act will not bring better industrial relations, but only worsen the situation. Wilson was able to baldly state that of course the Labour Party would repeal the Act and then go on to crow but he didn't expect the Tories to do that as it would lose them too much face. The 'left' groups were curiously passive throughout - they called no meetings to discuss the situation or even put an analysis of it; they organised no marches or demonstrations; they wrote no leaflets. In fact, they accepted that it was an event in the economic struggle for the dockers to lead as they were the protagonists and that the protagonists were not the working class led by a Bolshevik vanguard - i.e. they did not put the demand for a general strike to defeat the Act to the working class (even though IS had been arguing that this was necessary for months.) They accepted the limits of the political consciousness of the working class - that the principle at stake was the defense of members of their own class imprisoned by the ruling class - they made no attempt at being a Bolshevik vanguard.