outcome with the active militants, to attempt to avoid reactions of fatalism and demoralisation. But for the LRT it is not the combativity of the workers which is in question. What is in question is the line of the traditional leaderships of the workers movement, both political parties and in the trade unions, not excluding the environmentalists. These leaderships all capitulated to the austerity policies of Nothomb, Martens and company. They did so for one funda mental reason - they have no alternative, and refuse to lead a resolute struggle to kick out the government.
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not take six months for them to capit- discuss the way in which the wage cut
And all their elected representa- would be carried out after a climate of
THE ROLE OF THE POLITICAL PARTIES
On October 10, 1982, the workers of Liege elected a 'progressive' majority, composed of the Socialist Party, Walloon Rally, Walloon People's Rally, and the Ecologists (PS-RW-RPW-Eco), against the rightwing bloc of the Christian Democrats and Liberals (PSC-PRL). this vote they wanted to block the offensive of the Martens-Gol government. But the new council betrayed their hopes.
Despite all its fudging, the so-called
It accepted the framework of the Nothomb instructions, which demand that the budget balances
The council did not really look for any alternative ways to avoid a confrontation with the super-profit makers in the region - the banks, the pharmaceutical industry, petrol tankers, and luxury goods proabove all, the ruling council did not choose the only overall coherent way forward - to reject any cut in wages, and fight resolutely alongside the workers to defeat the government.
NO SOCIALIST ALTERNATIVE
From the beginning of the conflict a large group of the socialist representathe Burgomaster (mayor) Close and Digneffe (as well as Bertrand of the RW) took a position in favour of applying austerity measures to the workers wages. They did not even try to work pressure, they had to simply stall a while before being able to directly confront the
A current more to the left emerged in this period within the PS. For a while it delayed the hardening of the situation. But it did not have the courage to finally confront the PS apparatus and to continue unconditionally refusing to negotiate in the framework of a cut.
Thanks to this lack of consistent opposition, the rightwing current then able to get its last plan adopted unanimously, except for three absten-
The leadership of the French-speaking PS clearly supported this current. is nothing surprising in this as Spitaels was one of the first to apply wage-cuts and redundancies for CSTs and CRTs (job creation scheme workers). A plan which he had elaborated when in the govern-
ECOLOGISTS: REDUCE PRESTIGE
SPENDING AND SALARIES!
It didn't take six months for these militants to adopt the same objectives and take the same step as the other partners — make the workers pay for the crisis virtually alone.
Even compared to their own positions, which we have criticised for years, it did tives, without abstention, voted for a plan which put the full burden onto the lowerwage earners and increased the wage dif-
At no point did the Ecolos try to push for measures
That shows clearly both that they do not have a progressive alternative to offer and that, to keep a share of the power, they are ready to WHAT THE UNIONS DID
At one time the trade-union movement appeared to take its distance from the ruling council group. demonstration was even organised outside the PS headquarters. But in the end the union leadership in its turn gave in to
In fact this capitualtion had already been signalled by the behaviour of the bureaucracy throughout
Firstly the Executive always staked its bets on dialogue with the council (which necessitated social peace) rather than negotiation supported by the workers in even the combative members of the Executive never had the courage to confront the intersectoral (of all of the public service) or interprofessional (of the public and private
They accepted all their diktats so as not to put their posts as fulltimers in danger. But the union tops left them to face the anger of the workNO EXTENSION OF THE STRUGGLE
"We stayed isolated' said the union leadership, pretending not to know that solidarity has to be won; it will not be
'It's Gillon's fault, it's Gayetot's fault', said the officials of the Liege city union on the sly. (Gillon is leader of the metalworkers union in Liege. is national leader of the CGSP who comes from Liege). But which of them had the courage to confront the union bureaucracy, to go in person to use all their weight in an assembly of the steelworkers at Cockerill, or of the ALR (town council employees) at Charleroi.
A number of sectors had workstoppages of several hours, after hearing of the situation from the city workers them-
But they well knew that to win a broad cross-sectoral movement and thus decision-making general assemblies. Gillon did not want this. NO HARDENING UP OF THE STRIKE
Neither did the Liege city Execuitve of the ALR want to keep to a combative line in its workplace. Right up till the end it refused the further steps proposed by the firefighters or the hospital work-
In the last three weeks the union leadership really capitulated. It proceeded to social peace had first been restored, with the restart of rubbish collection 'warning' to those militants who instead put forward another stage in the struggle. Any negotiation which is not carried out on the basis of a relationship of forces
It is enough to compare the last two votes of the council. Between the two were eight days during which the union leadership gave up maintaining the fight.
The reason for such a discrepancy between the combativity of the workers and the attitude of the union leaderships is that the workers did not have the leadership of the strike. Nowhere were there decision-making mass meetings to assess the plan before the negotiations were
The town union was called together the next day to be told, and the CPAS (staff of the local welfare assistance board) ten days later!
The big gatherings on the square were stopped when the Executive realised that they might lose control of them. general meetings in the Congress Palace were stopped once the most militant discovered their enthuse the assembly and even to force the union committee to accept that the meeting could take decisions by vote. posed of the union committee enlarged to the militant workers, folded up after the workers decided to go themselves to meet their comrades at the Cockerill steel works.
What struck us once more was how a determined struggle can very rapidly raise the class consciousness of many workers. It only took a few weeks for the active militants to understand that the struggle, on the local level, could only be won if it took on the scope of a cross-sectoral struggle to bring down the government, and thus the objective had to be to prepare for a general strike.
Despite the weight of the bureaucracy, a large number of the workers obviously tried to take back the strike into their own hands. That is a gain in experience and a lesson that they will remember for
But, if the struggle is not to be lost, this experience will have to be into the statutes, into the actual functioning of the unions. It will have to be reflected in the election of more militant representatives during the elections next
It is also going to be necessary to strengthen the current of militants in the intersectoral within the CGSP who fight for an anti-capitalist perspective and prepare, in the long term, to join up with those in the interprofessional within the
Perhaps these two axes will give a way of avoiding demoralisation, and getting the fight restarted on the basis of con crete perspectives. The LRT which was present in the struggle through its active militants, its shop stewards, its bulletin The Communard, its paper La Gauche will commit itself to this objective.