Dockers start to ballot: Todd spreads political confusion
Labour Briefing1980sTranscribed by hand from the printed page.
Dockers have at last begun balloting for strike action.
The ballot result, which is likely to endorse the call for action, is likely to be known by about May 24th. The political problems of winning an all-out dock strike, however, remain unresolved.
Many stewards, however reluctantly and for various reasons, now seem to have accepted the Ron Todd line — although there are divisions and debates over the strategy in some ports.
• there is to be no "illegal" action in defence of the National Dock Labour Scheme, which Transport House has already written off;
• any strike must be against the Port Employers for refusing to replace the Scheme with one offering equal conditions.
It is hard to see how such a policy could be successful. It lays the dockers open to divisive manoeuvres by the employers and piecemeal offers in individual ports.
No port employer is going to give guarantees equal to those of the Scheme, although they may make empty promises designed to confuse the issue.
The port employers cannot conceivably concede anything on the workers' control element of the Dock Labour Scheme, which gives dockers one-for-one representation on its controlling bodies.
Only the continuation of the Scheme can defend the jobs and working conditions of both the registered dockers and the 30,000 non-registered workers whose wages and conditions are linked directly to the Scheme ports.
What makes Ron Todd's policy even worse is that it is advanced for the worst possible reason: to try and avoid conflict with the law.
The courts have just declared illegal a London Underground strike ballot which was directly over the actions of management by inventing technicalities concerning the wording of the ballot paper.
They would have no difficulty with a strike triggered by the introduction of Bill into Parliament — whatever hoops are jumped through by the TGWU.
TGWU officials have been busy spelling out to the dockers what working within the law means:
• there must be no action of any kind in the unregistered ports, either solidarity action or the boycotting of scab cargo diverted from striking Scheme ports;
• there must be no picketing of the non-Scheme ports by striking dockers, or any other pressure to stop them handing scab cargo;
• there must be no action by other workers who send materials through the docks, which would equally be classed as secondary action.
A dock strike run along such lines, with striking dockers required to stand back and see their work done by others, would be a recipe for disaster.
Although not all cargo from the Scheme ports could be switched, there are hundreds of unregistered ports capable of handling a damaging amount of it.
It is crucial for the whole trade union movement that the dockers defend the Scheme — but it is also crucial that they win, not go down in gallant defeat.
Whatever strategy the strike is fought on, however, the whole labour movement has an obligation to give the dockers full support — starting now.
The Solidarity Network meeting in Hull on May 6th heard reports from a number of Support Groups which have been set up and planned activities.
Some have already contacted the ports nearest to them, made twinning arrangements with dockers, and fixed up meetings for them to address.
These initiatives need to be multiplied many times over to build the kind of support movement which will be needed once the strike starts.