The Working Class
Must End its Marginalisation and Set its Own Agenda
WDIE congratulates the train drivers at Connex for
winning their demands, and regards this as a positive development. It is a blow
to the Blairite thesis that the class struggle is over and that the role of the
workers and their trade unions is to concentrate on their employers’
interests. However, the matter by no means ends there, and the workers should
beware of being enticed to fall into any trap which says that their role ends
with such a victory.
The main issue that the train drivers, in common with all
workers, have to pay attention to is, who is setting the agenda? The struggle
of the train drivers took place in the context of the privatisation and break
up of the rail network. This programme has been implemented by the government
in response to the crisis of the social welfare state and nationalisation. The
programme of privatisation superseded that of the "old left", of
state control and state investment in infrastructure. It has been justified
with theories that competition is necessary for efficiency, for modernisation
and for the benefit of the customer, for the people as a whole. But on the
railways, it is clear that such a programme has resulted in a service which is
spiralling downwards, a scandalous safety record which is causing grave
concern, increased pressure on the workers but handouts and soaring profits for
the financial oligarchy. If such a programme is continued, can it be said that
the train drivers have won a lasting victory? It would be very blinkered and
narrow-minded to make such a statement.
The state and its government have been setting the agenda
on the railways, as in all spheres of the society. It has profoundly affected
not only the conditions of the workers but of the rail users. A similar thing
is true for the ramifications of this agenda throughout the society. Not only
have the workers been marginalised from having any say in this agenda and in
the running of society, but this present government is attempting to make sure
that the thought of participating in setting the agenda for society never
enters the workers’ heads. It is saying that the trade unions should never
dabble in politics, that the workers should even forget their class, that
partnership with the employers to be competitive globally is the order of the
day.
The workers cannot accept this role given to them by the
government. Nor can they accept that they should continually be fighting
struggles in defence of their pay and working conditions and leave the matter
there. If they are continually excluded from setting their own agenda for
society, then not only will their pay and working conditions continue to
deteriorate and such battles be fought again and again, but the crisis in the
whole of society will continue to intensify.
How can the workers end their marginalisation and begin to
put themselves in a position where they are the ones who set the agenda? They
must begin by working out how to develop and implement a programme that arises
from their own experience, and will take them on a line of march that leads to
a new society. Against the anti-social offensive, they will develop the
programme to Stop Paying the Rich – Increase Investments in Social
Programmes! In developing this programme, they must begin on the basis of
setting their own agenda, of raising the level of discussion on this agenda,
and should form groups of Writers and Disseminators for this purpose.
