In Luxembourg, the European elections The Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire, Luxembourg section of the Fourth International, is running slates in both.
In the southern district, the LCR is running a slate of 12 candidates, and in the central district a slate of 10 for the parliamentary elections. In the northern and eastern districts, it calls for a vote for the traditional workers parties, the CP
In the European elections, the LCR is running a slate of 12 candidates. Euro-candidates are also standing on the parliamentary slates.
A 25-page, illustrated election program has already been published and is being circulated, along with posters and other
In the May 14 issue of its paper, Klassenkampf, the LCR presented a summary of its election program in eight points.
The first point explained the roots and character of the economic crisis:
"For nearly ten years now, the capitalist system has been showing what had nearly been forgotten, that it means continual crises that spare the rich but impoverish the workers of the developed and underdeveloped countries...In Luxembourg in the last three years, the masses of working people have lost 1520% of their buying power....
"From Brussels...the Europe of the capitalists dictates how many plants have to be closed in ten countries. But when acid-rain clouds spread across borders, destroying whole sections of woodland, it has nothing to say...Protection of the environment has to be done on an international basis. But it is not profitable, and so the International of the capitalists has nothing to say about it.
"In a lot of industries, where the capitalists cannot make sufficient profits anymore, they are turning to arms protection....The vicious circle has begun. As in the period of the last great crisis, have to be used sometime."produced will the arms that are being
The second point was unity and independence of the working people from the capitalist parties, the Christian Demo-
"The Christian Democrat and Liberal has made the poor poorer and the rich richer. But that is not enough. In 1974, when the Christian Democrats were forced to go into opposition, there was then got in bed with the Liberals because they said they were more progressive. The divorce came in 1979. coalition with the Liberals, the Social Democrats had to carry out the policy of the bourgeoisie. And that was followed by five years of rule by the all-bourgeois bloc, with disastrous results for the work-
"Now since the Liberals have shown themselves too openly to be the party of big capital, the Social Democrats want to get back into government in coalition the Christian Democrats because, while they are reactionary, they also control a labor confederation. That is no
"The working people, who constitute the overwhelming majority of the population, must develop their own policy, free from collaboration with the bourgeois parties and the mechanisms of 'codeter-
"So, to oppose the block of the capitalist forces around the Christian Democrats and Liberals, we need a block of the workers organizations that will fight uncompromisingly for a policy against austerity and the capitalists.
"The united union demonstration on March 27, 1982 and the general strike of April 5, 1982 to defend the sliding scale of wages showed the full power of the Luxembourg working class. This strength could have been built on....
"We call for a workers government based on the unions, that will uncompromisingly carry out an antiausterity policy.
The third point was the following:
"Instead of nationalizing the deficits of the steel companies and leaving the capitalists the profit, we call for nationalization without compensation and under workers control."
The statement explained: "It has become the fashion to fill the breaches in the industrialists' finances with state money without investing. Thus, tens of thousands of jobs have been eliminated and whole regions...dismantled, without the capitalists losing a hair off their
In connection with this point, the
"We also demand a stop to the running down of other sectors, such as transport, where public transport is being cut back and the quality lowered."
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The fourth point called for "building time rapidly increased the militarization to recruit youth to the army has in short Chrysler strike last year, the UAW recogstrong, democratic and militant unions. The LCR is fighting to transform the unions from immobile bureaucratic apparatuses oriented toward compromises into fighting organizations in which all currents will have the full rights to express themselves and in which rank-andas the factory sections involved can rely on their problems being
They have to take their fate into their own hands."
There were subpoints on youth and
"The LCR and its youth organization, Fonken [Sparks] are for self-organization of the youth, self-managed youth centers, freedom in choosing a profession and union control of the training
With respect to women, the statement organization of women and unity with the workers movement. It calls for the full right to work for women, equal pay for equal work, good childcare centers financed by the state in all the major
The fifth point was on defense of the
"There can be no political neutrality on the environment....There are better forms of technology more suited to the environment. Applying them by no means represents stopping technical ad-
But the big companies are blocking the development and application of such technology...because this runs counter to their short-term profit interests.
"The LCR by no means goes along with the sort of theories that call for zero-growth, but it holds that the destrue.
broad mobilizations in Luxand the neighboring countries against the missiles have shown that the rulers are in a minority on this question....
"The LCR demands stopping and reversing the militarization of Luxembourg, reduction of the military budget by at least 50%"
The seventh point demanded "solidarity with the revolution in Central America; solidarity with Solidarnosc."
"In the Central American countries, we can see...what the military power of the West and the USA represents - a means for oppressing whole peoples and continents that are trying to free themselves from the yoke of neocolonialism and capitalism.
"The LCR calls for active defense revolutionary Nicaragua through material help, political support, sending international work. brigades, twinning of Luxembourg cities with Nicaraguan
"The Polish working class has shown what the working people in the so-called socialist countries think about this bureaucratic repressive caricature of social-
They have also indicated in their program how a socialist, self-managed society really run by the working class can be built in those countries where capitalism has been abolished.
"The fate of the Polish working class and that of workers in the West are closely bound together. The Polish workers' fight to free the imprisoned Solidarnose activists, for trade-union freedom and to oust the Jaruzelski dictatorship is also
The final point was for unity of the workers movement.
"At a time when the Christian Democrats and liberals are in power and the bosses are attacking the wages and jobs of the working class, the basic gains of the workers movement, everything must be done to reinforce the workers movement and its organizations....
"Only a strong workers movement prepared to go on the offensive can carry through class-struggle proposals actions. Therefore, every reinforcement of the workers parties strengthens the entire workers movement. Therefore, every strengthening of the workers organizations reinforces the potential of the entire movement to mobilize against the government and the bosses."
This statement was accompanied by a program of urgent measures for a workers government, which included some additional points, such as the following:
political and social rights for immigrant workers." "Abolition of bus and train fares." "Diplomatic recogni-
Salvadoran FDR-FMLN." "Breaking all diplomatic, political, economic and military relations with South Africa, Turkey and the Latin Americar dictatorships."
Central demands in this program were for immediate introduction of the 35hour week and restoration of the sliding
Canadian UAW prepares contract fight tion of the environment has reacheri pro portions that demand urgent action *r calls for a state program to develop the new technologies, especially in the energy nationalization of the energy industry....
"We support the international movements fighting the destruction of the environment....Thus, we are for the national and international labor movement intervening more in all questions affecting the environment."
The sixth point called for "stopping the dismantling of democratic rights, the militarization of the country and the threat of war."
"The reinforcement of the intelligence service, the creation of new specialized police units to suppress rebellions, the legalization of phone tapping and the military requisition law...have set in motion a process whereby the capitalist state can act in a more and more repressive way against oppressed strata. LCR demands repeal of all these laws and
"The building of the Nato base, WA, of the US army base in Beles, the expansion of Findel for military purposes, the stationing of AWAC reconnaisance planes in Luxembourg and the stepped up drive
The following article appeared in the May 7 issue of Socialist Voice, a revolusocialist biweekly published in Hurmuses, a member of the United Auto
TORONTO - "The period of concessions is behind us!" message of the Collective Bargaining and Legislation Conference of the United Auto Workers (UAW) in Canada held here April 14-15. The UAW is gearing up for a battle to regain what auto workers were forced to give up in the last round of negotiations in 1982
The conference discussed union policy for contract negotiations with all major employers of UAW members. The key showdown this year will be with General Motors and Ford. Contracts covering 36,000 workers at GM and 14,000 at Ford expire in September.
The upturn in the industry has meant record profits for the auto companies nad a growing militancy among auto work-
Inspired by the victory of the nizes that now is the time to fight hard
The more than 300 delegates, representing 120,000 union members mainly from Ontario and Quebec, laid out a series of demands for the bargaining table and for political action in preparation for the expected federal election. Bargaining priorities include:
A substantial immediate wage increase and restoration of the "annual improvement factor" (the yearly wage increase, traditionally 3 percent, that was given up in the last contract).
Improvements in the cost-of-living Reduced work time to combat high unemployment. In the 1982 contract the union was forced to give up 10 paid personal holidays per year. The delegates were determined to recoup this loss in one form or another. An important aspect of the fight for reduced work time is the fight for the right to refuse over-
Workers at many Ford and GM plants have been plagued by forced over-
The union is also demanding improve-
International Viewpoint 4 June 1984
Further step to unity of ments in supplemental unemployment benefits and pensions and the elimination of "new hire" rates.
The last contract allowed the companies to pay newly hired workers less than the full wage for
South African independent unions their first 18 months on the job.
The conference firmly rejected profitsharing schemes currently being pro-
. further step towards unity of the the non-industry-based unions, organising moted by the auto companies with the agreement of the UAW leadership in the
These programs, UAW Canadian Director Bob White said, add "uncertainty to workers' lives, leaving our wages more directly contingent on the success of management's decisions, interest rate fluctuations and the general direction of the economy."
The conference also rejected phony "Quality of Work Life" programs designed to undercut the union.
the conference struck a militant and confident tone.
Women's issues were highlighted at the Toronto conference. Demands for mandatory affirmative action in hiring and job upgrading were adopted. The confercompany-sponsored, union-controlled child care, a demand already won by UAW Local 1325 in Stratford, Ontario.
A delegate from Quebec explained the need to defend the workers movement from the corporate blackmail of companies moving or threatening to move out
The conference came out strongly for the defense and improvement of the medicare system. It proposed the elimination of user fees and extra billing.
In the keynote speech, Bob White urged UAW members to get involved in politics. He stressed the need to defend the New Democratic Party (NDP). Canada's union-based labor party, against the independent unions in South Africa has been achieved, after a period of seeming
The formation of a unified trade-union federation was decided in April 1983. (International Viewpoint, No 31, May 30, 1983). A liaison comcommittee has existed since that historic Athlone summit, the fourth of its kind. It is composed on a parity basis bedifferent union organisa-
But it then took almost a year for the unions involved in this process to agree, on March 3-4, 1984, to draft the document forming the future federation. One basic principle has already been adopted:
federation will organise industrybased unions, with the objective of eventually having one single union per in-
This orientation was approved by the main organisations: the two federations, Unions (FOSATUS) and Council of Unions of South Africa (CUSA), each of which has more than 100,000 members, the commercial union CCAWUSA, the food workers union FCWU, the municipal workers union of Cape Town CTMWA, and the General Workers Union organising dockers and metalworkers, that is in total, 24 unions representing more than 300,000 workers. The proposal made to workers on a 'general' basis, was to have the status of observers in the liaison committee as the purpose of this body was not simply to exchange ideas, but to organise the foundation of the united
The general unions present rejected this proposal left the meeting these was SAAWU, which has its original links with the black consciousness movement and today identifies with the South African Congress of Trade Unions and the Freedom Charter of the African National Congress.
It seems that in general the unified which could be launched towards the end of this year will not subordinate itself to the United Democratic Front (UDF). (See IV, No 46, February 13, 1984, for the role and character of the UDF.) The CUSA has chosen to participate in both the UDF and its rival the National
The other five organisations have rejected affiliation in order not to divide MWASA, two of whose regional branches had joined the UDF have paid for this by
Thus, the independent trade-union movement has confirmed its role as an essential pole of unity within the mass movement.
current attacks from the bosses and the Growing international support for British miners media and called for stronger LAW sup port for the NDP in the coming federal election campaign.
Ontario NDP leader Bob Rae and federal leader Ed Broadbent both gave major talks to the conference.
White, Rae and Broadbent all argued that the key solution to the problems facing auto workers and workers in other industries is a protectionist campaign for increased Canadian content. taken view, which provides no real answer to the fight against unemployment, was shared by most of the delegates.
UAW members at the conference were encouraged to get more involved in international issues. The main conference resolution supported "the long struggle of the Black workers in South Africa for freedom and justice and the desire of the Nicaraguan people to defend their revolution against the hostility and intervention of the US." Congress's peace petition and were presented as priorities for the union.
At the end of the conference delegates joined the picket lines of striking Toronto hotel workers in a show of solidarity.
All in all, the conference was marked by a genuine fighting spirit. International Viewpoint 4 June 1984
British miners received a boost on May 12, with the decision of the Mineworkers International Federation meeting in Luxembourg that a coal blockade of Britain
The Federation includes unions in the United States, Australia, South Africa and West Germany, all of which countries supply coal to Britain.
According to reports in the Financial Times, 'a senior Polish trade union official denied reports that Poland would supply extra coal to the UK this year - though he confirmed that shipments of 540,000 tonnes of coking coal and nearly 200,000 tonnes of other coals would be delivered as contracts specified.'
The report continued: 'Mr Rajmund Moric, head of the new miners' union in Katowice, in southern Poland, said that British importers had asked for 100,000 extra tonnes of coal "but they won't be getting them":
The decision of the Mineworkers International Federation gives the green for militant miners in affiliated unions to demand action to stop extra coal supplies getting to Britain.
would strengthen steps taken by rank and file dockers and rail workers in preventing coal being imported into Britain.
Such solidarity is desperately needed As the strike enters its fourth month, hardship is becoming widespread among
However, the reaction of miners' wives is to become more involved in the strike, with wives joining pickets against scabbing in the Notting hamshire area.
Those going to work against union orders are now being faced with expulsions from the National Union of Mineworkers. Talks began on May 13 between the Coal Board and the miners union, but an early settlement of the dispute is widely discounted by observers.
All donations and messages of support to National Union of Mineworkers, Vicar Lane, Telephone: South Yorkshire S1 2EX. directly by sending to Miners Solidarity Fund, Co-op Bank, West Street, Sheffield,
Sorting code 08 90 75, account number 300 00 009.