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Prime Minister Winston Churchill's wind in the U.S. capital is

Teflected in a hurricane of revolt now sweeping the British labor

Movement,

LONDON

| Ft day after Chancellor of
yh Exchequer Butler an-
aaa Britain’s first Conser-
_*Uve budget ‘for seven years, a
a of miners stood round the
an €ad in the village of Kames
Ayrshire, ‘Scotland. They
aol their feet in the cold
eh uted air as they waited to
Bin the pit for the first
aes t of the day. They were
saan albout the budget — most
ee about the increase in the
is 2 of bread. A lot of bread
oe onsumed in mining com-
yeaa ‘the wives fill their
“ohne lunch-buckets with
othe y of thick sandwiches for
in Mmid-shift meal-break. The
Tease of 14d in the price of

would mean real hardship.

It didn’t take these 200 miners
long to make up their minds.
They saw at once what it may
'take some sections of the British
workers a little longer to real-
ize — that the Butler budget was

a vicious class measure, design-°

ed not to solve Britain’s trade
crisis, but to take money out

of the. pockets of the workers.

and put it in the pockets of the
wealthy. With one accord they
went back home. A mass meet-
ing of all three shifts later in
the day endorsed their action,
resolved on a one-day stoppage.

Each day since Budget Day
has seen the mass movement of
working-class anger grow. Pit
after pit has decided to ban the

PEVEURUR EEE EERE BRE RENE BUREN ERE EEE EEE PEELE ENE ESE CEB BEN EERE EEE EEE EL EL EERE EE EEE BREE BNE NEE BBY

British labor

moves left

PTT te

with growing unemployment,
have closed down their works
one hour or two before time and
held mass meetings.
- Each day deputations from all
over the country—trade union-
ists, cooperators, housewives,
old-age pensioners—have storm-
ed the House of Commons in the
most gigantic mass lobbying ‘of
MP’s seen since. before the war.
The commercial press did its
‘est to minimize the effect the
budget will have on the poorer
sections of the people. The four-
million-a-day Daily Mirror pro-
claimed it “the not-so-tough
budget.” But the workers were
not taken in — those who have
been deceived will not stay that
way for long. -

e
By cutting food subsidies to
tthe tune of £160 million the
Tories have sent food prices
soaring. Besides the increase in
the price of bread, the house-
\wife now has to pay 14d a
pound more for meat, 8%d a
pound more for flour, 4d a
pound for tea, and a penny a
quart more for milk.
By putting the bank rate up
from 2% percent to 4 percent,
. the Tories have taken the first
step along the road to the mil-
lion unemployed by the end of
the year that Labor ex-minis-
ters have ‘been freely forecast-
ing. ;

BY PETER FRYER

and short-time working, particu-

larly marked in textiles, cloth-
ing and metal industries, is run-
ning at an estimated rate of five
million mandays a week —
equivalent to a million fully un-
employed.

Increase in the bank rate is a
deliberate step to further length-
ening of the dole queue; it cre-
ates a scarcity of money, and
small businessmen are less
eager to carry out renovations,
invest in new machinery or new

enterprise of any kind. The
Tories reckon that a pool of un-
employment will cool the work-
ers’ will to strike, and will thus
make it possible for them to
clamp down on wage demands

and even impose wage-cuts
eventually.
e

Britain’s workers are making
ready for an all-out fight to de-
fend their jobs, their wages and
their living standards. Thous-
ands whose traditional loyalty
to Labor held their fighting
spirit in check during the years
of Labor rule are keen to “have
a go at the Tories.”

This new mood, the fresh
clean breeze that is sweeping
through the working-class move-
ment jn Britain, is making itself
felt at the very top of the Labor
party itself. Despite the efforts

a)

DUS TT Se 2

boil the rearmament contro-
versy down to a mere Bevan-
Attlee squabble, for personal
power, the issues are far deep-
er and more serious.

Whatver shortcomings Bevan
may have, personally and prolit-
ically + he ‘is not against re-
armament as such, wants it cut
down to a figure Britain’s econ-
omy can afofrd — he has emerg-
ed as the leader for the time be-
ing, of a powerful leftward
‘trend inside the party. So pow-
erful is it that 57 Labor MP’s
defied the leadership by voting

program.
So powerful is it that the Rail-

. way Review, organ of the 450,

000 railwaymen wrote editorial-

-ly last week:

“The Labor leadership long
ago alienated the rank and file.
There is absolutely: no doubt
that if a referendum was held
the bulk of the labor movement
would support the Bevanites.”

So powerful is this leftward
trend that, although the cracks
have been pasted over for the
time being by compromise re-
solutions, the annual Labor
party conference this autumn
will undoubtedly see a decisive
‘pattle between those who want
to see the party remain tied to
a war policy, and those who

ae loaf, together with the other voluntary Saturday overtime Already Britain's unemploy- of most of the press, Labor’s : :
Nereases Butler announced, shift. ‘Motor workers, faced ment is around the 400,000 mark; own Daily Herald included, to want a socialist peace policy. *
eeeesee a :

“AS for the Communists,
: may I say I think all
Communists should be dis-
franchised. I say that because
if they were, they would not
‘be qualified to run for any
office,”

The above statement was

lature on March 12 iby Tory
member W. K. Warrender
(Hamilton:Centre). It was
directed at LPP member J.
» Salsberg (Toronto-St. An-
drew), But its not-so-veiled
implication is a threat to
thousands of Ontario citizens
‘who vote for progressive can-
lal and federal elections. It
1s “Duplessism” in Ontario.
Warrender’s statement
crew immediate reaction in-
a and outside ‘the legis-
ature. Tory member R. M.
yers (Waterloo South)
Made it clear the following
day that he did not share the

but added: “I wish to dissas-
eng myself—and I cannot
“0 it quickly enough—from
€ remarks of the member
a Hamilton-Centre insofar
< they relate to disfranchis-
es members of the Commun-
St party in Canada.”
: Outside the Jegislature citi-
US of various political views
‘ SN telephoned and talked
ee ere ‘about Warren-
a S attack on democratic
HS Some have voted
pea ost the LPP member,
Some for him, but all agreed

Made in the Ontario legis-'

idates in municipal, provin-

Political views of Salsberg,

in their opposition to any
attempt to silence Salsberg
as the leading opposition
member in the Ontario legis-
Jature.

That’s what the Tory ma-
chine would like to do: gag
Salsberg. To any observer,
the LPP member is recog-
nized as the “one man Oppo-
sition” in the 90-member
house of 79 Tories, eight Lib-
erals and two ‘CCF’ers. The
Liberals, who have few dif-
ferences with the Frost ad-
ministration, have been com-
paratively silent since the
session opened last month.
The two CCF members ap-

pear to be overwhelmed by .

the Tory majority.
@ ‘

“Salsberg, ‘however, an-
nounced on opening day that
the duty of the opposition is
to “attack, attack and at-
tack.” That’s what he has
been doing, much to the dis-
comfiture of the government.
The Tory back penchers,
given ‘the green light by the
eabinet, . have made SI.B.”

' their main target during the
traditional Throne Speech de-
‘pate.

J. Yaremko, the present
member for Toronto - Bell-
woods, launched the red-
baiting attack. He was fol-
lowed ‘by A. H. Cowling, Tory
member for Toronto-High
Park,: who made a vicious
attack on the St. Andrew
member. It is worth noting
that even the daily press paid

less attention to Cowling’s
attack than they did to the
dignity with which Salsberg
conducted himself in the leg-
islature.

Then came Warrender and
his proposal for the “dis-
franchisement of the Com-
munists.” Warrender’s
speech was also accompanied
by ‘an unprecedented ruling -
by the Speaker of the House
which permitted the Tory
member to use the unparlia-
mentary term “untrue.” It
was applied to a letter re-
garding the danger of com-
pulsory arbitration which
Salsberg had sent to Ontario
‘unions before the Ontario

legislature convened. The
LPP member’s. objections
were overruled, but the

Speaker declined Warrender’s
“thanks.” ~

e ;

Why does a Tory adminis-
tration with a ‘deadweight of
a 79-11 majority fear one .
man? I have notes before me
regarding a “routine” educa-
tional ‘bill. It provided the
establishment of a board to
examine “slow learning” pu-
pils to determine whether
they should go to special in-
dustrial schools or continue
in regular classes. Salsberg’s
request that the second read-
ing of the bill be held over
until the entire Ontario edu-
cational system be discussed
in relation to the Hope Re-
port (buried by the Frost ad-

Leader of the Ontario opposition

ministration) ‘brought epi-
thets and interjections from
the premier and three cab-
inet members.

What they’re afraid of is
the voice of the people ex-
pressed in Salsberg’s one-man
opposition.

Since the House went into
session he is the only mem-
ber who has challenged the
government. Here are just
some of the issues he has
already raised:

What are you going to do
about the unemployed?

What are you going to do
about Ontario penal institu-
tions? (It was Salsberg’s ex-
posures during 1951 which
compelled the government to
take halting steps during the
present session of the legis-
lature.)

The LPP member is also
demanding that any proposed |
St. Lawrence seaway be a
“Canadian seaway,” not a
‘highway for the carrying off
of our resources by the U.S.

But the main reason the
Tory regime at Queen’s Park
would like to silence Sals-
berg is because he speaks out
against the betrayal of On-
tario (and Canada) to the
Yankee trusts, because his is
the voice of peace in the
legislature.

“J.B.” wants to see not a
“one-man opposition,” but an
11-man attack on government
policies; he wants the Lib-
eral and CCF members to
raise their voices too.

J. B. SALSBERG .
LPP member of the Ontario

legislature

‘against the Tory rearmament

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PACIFIC TRIBUNE — MARCH 28, 1952 — PAGE 9