Labour Two weeks of vacation in Britain gave me some idea of the amount of class strug- gle seething in that country. Most of it is around the poll tax or, as Maggie Thatcher prefers to call it, “the community charge.” The poll tax is a pro- foundly undemocratic levy that has milli- onaires paying the same amount as their servants. It has been implemented in Scotland for a year now with over one million Scots refusing to pay. As of April it comes into effect in both England and Wales, where it’s estimated that there will an additional 10-11 million refuseniks. : Political pundits and newspaper colum- nists have charged the Thatcher govern- ment with breaking the cardinal rule that you should never offend everybody at the same time. That has given the Labour Party a marvelous chance to harness opposition to the poll tax. At the same time, the British pound is on a downward spiral. The British budget came in with a remarkable resemblance to the Canadian one, with a main emphasis on inflation control that has interest rates climbing out of sight. The budget came in two days before the Staffordshire byelection which was a “safe” Tory seat (won by 17,000 votes in the last election). The poll resulted in the Labour Party winning the seat with over 7,000 votes. Most interviewed voters, Tory partisans previously, cited the tax and Margaret Thatcher as reasons for desert- ing the Conservatives. In all the actions it is clear there is no major role being played by the British trade union movement. There are disturb- ing signs that remind me of the NDP and > the free trade fight in Canada. That is seen in the dilemma the Labour Party faces in the poll tax struggle. Most of the local governments are Labour-domi- nated and have to implement the despised tax, and Labour Party leader Neil Kin- nock has called on those governments to obey the law. Labour Party spokespersons are saying that if you don’t support the law when in’ opposition, how can you expect others to comply with the law when there is a Labour government? They also state that LABOUR IN ACTION the Tory policy can only be changed through the ballot box. So there’s a political vacuum that’s been filled by a number of forces that include what is called the “hard left.” That means Trotskyists, Maoists, anarchists, other assorted Marxists and the Militant ten- dency of the Labour Party. They have come together in a new municipal forma- tion that even counts in its ranks disaf- fected Tories. Some 1,500 local groups are affiliated under the umbrella of the National Feder- ation of Anti-Poll Tax Unions. This movement was kicked off in Scotland. — While violence has marred some demon- strations, it hasn’t stopped the rallying call of “Can’t Pay, Won’t Pay” from becom- ing the slogan for England and Wales. Another indication of support for the Poll tax spurs revolt against Thatcher | different left parties, such as the Socialist ' Workers Party, is the major increase in the sales of the assorted left newspapers. Just last weekend the National Federa- tion of Anti-Poll Tax Unions organized a huge country-wide demonstration in every major centre. The biggest one, in London, attracted anywhere from 40,000 to 200,000 people (estimates varied). The Labour Party faces other prob- — lems. Over 30 of its sitting MPs have pub- _ licly proclaimed they will refuse to pay. At _ the same time Labour Militant-dominated Liverpool council has refused to imple- ment the tax. One thing is clear: barring some sort of miracle, Prime Minister Thatcher is gone, and most likely along with her Tory party. ¥ Victor Keegan, a columnist in the Guardian, summed it up best when he wrote: “The poll tax has become the eco- nomic equivalent of a virus ina commuter. program which is threatening to get out of control. : “The extra money to be taken out of the economy by the poll tax is three times that of this year’s budget in a full year, assum- ing it is paid in full. This must represent the government’s last attempt at a major redistribution of income from the poorer to wealthier people. That well has now run dry. At the bottom lies chaos. In theory, and in practice.” Campaign response echoes mass rejection of GST Continued from page 1 “We had people taking their mothers out of homes to sign ballots. We had merchants down at Granville Island, who when they discovered that their mall manager wouldn’t let us conduct the ballot, come out and say, no no no, we want the ballot here.” B.C. Fed secretary-treasurer Angela Schira said the campaign results far sur- passed expectations, succeeding even though volunteers were kicked out of four major shopping malls in the Lower Mainland. “That has even surprised me about how concerned the grassroots people in this pro- vince are about this GST and want tosenda message to Brian Mulroney that this tax is not acceptable. “They were telling people at those booths that they’re not just concerned about the GST, they want a fair taxation system in this country,” Schira said. : Jean Swanson, of the coalition End Leg- islated Poverty and the Coalition Against “Free” Trade, said the campaign helped educate people on the unfair nature of the tax system in Canada — that social pro- grams do not have to be cut if corporations and the wealthy pay their fair share. And the campaign told Canadians and British Columbians that they can have a say in how taxes are implemented, she said. “This is just the beginning ... of an incredible grassroots network that is really going fight this GST effectively. The cam- paign has given people a sense that it’s our right to participate, it’s our right to have decent education and social programs, it’s our right to have a country where corpora- tions and rich people pay their share.” Literally hundreds of organizations took part in the coast-to-coast Canada cam- paign. In British Columbia, organizer Nor- ris listed several of the dozens: the United Church, the Italian Canadian Federation, . . the Romanian community of Vancouver, the Lutheran church, the Anglican church, the Christian Task Force on Central Amer- ica, the Downtown Eastside Residents Association, several Sikh temples, com- munity centre, several other religious, Members of the International Long- shoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union on the West Coast of this country and the U.S. were set to shut down port oper- ations for a day April 14 in honour of Harry Bridges, the man who led the strike that resulted in the founding of the union and main- tained its militant and democratic traditions through- out his more than 40 years of a ership. ~ Bridges died i San Francisco March 30 and union members in the U.S. also stopped work that day in his memory. Born in Australia, Bridges had been BRIDGES Shutdown honours Bridges working on the San Francisco docks for several years when he and a handful of others launched the organizing drive that culminated in the West Coast strike May 9, 1934. When police attacked pickets in San Francisco on Bloody Thursday in July, workers responded with a three- day general strike that virtually para- lysed the city. Longshoremen Won shorter hours, better pay, a union hiring hall and — four years later — a new militant union, the ILWU. Under Bridges’ leadership, the ILWU became a centre of democratic trade unionism and maintained its progressive stand despite the gathering cold war. The union was expelled trom the ClO tor “Communist domination” — it was re- admitted without conditions in 1988 — and Bridges himself was the target of repeated attempts by the U.S. govern- ment to deport him. 12 e Pacific Tribune, April 23, 1990 Campaign for Fair Taxes spokespersons Jean Swanson (), Angela Schira and Pe ol Norris hail results of anti-GST ballot at B.C. Federation of Labour offices April 9. community, ethnic and women’s organiza- tions, and trade unions. At the B.C. Fed office on April 9, the walls were festooned with lists of the votes coming in from various B.C. centres. Key centres of activity included Port Hardy (1,375 votes), Campbell River (7,160), North Okanagan (2,700) and Peace River (2,890). Victoria, where the local Pro- Canada Network branch and the labour council worked together, reported 12,200 votes by the early evening. Campuses throughout the Lower Main- land also collected several votes. The cam- paign at Douglas College, Capilano College, the Langara and City Centre cam- puses of Vancouver Community College, and Simon Fraser University was in con- junction with a Canadian Federation of Students campaign launched in mid- February. The student campaign, with the theme, “If you love education,” has gathered 6,000 postcards from B.C. campuses protesting the GST and Bill C33, which imposes a three-per-cent surtax on student loans, CF Pacific Region chair Pam Frache said. David Rice of the B.C. branch of t Canadian Labour Congress said campaig organizers will be assessing how best to us the results of the ballot in the next thre weeks. The Senate, Canada’s Liberal dominate upper house, may hold hearings and pr pose several amendments on the legislatio which is supposed to implemented Jan. 1991. Federal New Democrat leader Aué rey McLaughlin has called on the Senate scrap the bill. During the campaign volunteers pointe out to the public features of the current ta) system, which saw 89,000 money-makif companies pay no tax at all in 1986, ant cited billions of dollars in revenue 10 through Tory measures such as enerf deregulation and the free trade pact. The campaign called for measures lik ending deferrals of corporate taxes ait implementing taxes on mergers and larg concentrations of wealth.