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Salient. Victoria University Student Newspaper. Volume 36, Number 4. 21st March 1973

Labour Must Control Workers

Labour Must Control Workers

As several unions have told the Labour Bills Committee, the Industrial Relations Bill is completely obnoxious and should be thrown out. But the Government ean-not do so unless it is prepared to bring about fundamental structural changes in the economy. In the sixty-two years of its existence the Labour Party has always been a reformist party which exists to protect the capitalist system by alleviating grievances through social welfare schemes etc. Some of the early Labour politicians, like the party's first leader Harry Holland, did believe in fundamental social change, but they quickly became irrelevant to the main course of Labour's development as an electoral force.

What this means is that the Labour Government and its cousin, the Federation of Labour, have a vested interest in reasserting order and control over rank and file trade unionists. If they cannot do so their reason for existence becomes very questionable. Therefore while the more obviously fascist provisions will no doubt go, much of the Bill is likely to become law.

For the revolutionary however, it is unfortunate that the Industrial Relations Bill will not be enacted as drafted. Recent experience in Britain proves that Government and management cannot force punitive legislation on workers and expect them not to react. If the present draft Bill was to be introduced it would go further than any other single act towards educating workers about the real nature of our economic system. It would inevitably produce bitter conflict, especially in the so called essential industries, which include the transport industries, traditional the home of the more militant unions.

Photo of a protesters running from police on horseback

Top: Police armed with batons, disperse a meeting of the unemployed in Cuba Street in 1932, at the height of the depression.

Photo of police and protesters during a 1913 strike

Bottom: Soldiers with fixed bayonets in Buckle Street during the 1913 Maritime Strike. As both the Tory Government and the militant strikers prepared for a showdown, there was an atmosphere of Civil War in Wellington. Photos from the Alexander Turnbull Library.