19. In Place of Strife¶
Core Argument¶
The Wilson government, elected in 1964, was immediately subjected to financial blackmail by Lord Cromer of the Bank of England, who threatened a capital strike unless the government abandoned its programme. Wilson later acknowledged this as an attempt to render elections a farce by forcing a newly elected government into Tory policies. Rather than resisting with socialist measures, the government capitulated to the City, introducing orthodox cuts, a Prices and Incomes Policy, and an assault on unofficial strikes. The incomes policy was sold as “planned growth of wages” but functioned, as Marx’s analysis of surplus value predicts, to boost profits at the expense of wages. Following a 1966 landslide, Wilson imposed a wage freeze with statutory enforcement, prompting Frank Cousins’ resignation. The government declared a state of emergency during the 1966 seafarers’ strike, with Wilson accusing strikers of political motivation; John Prescott attacked the government for bowing to international banks, though the seafarers won concessions. The Devlin Inquiry into the docks recommended reorganisation linked to a reduced workforce, leading to containerisation and mass redundancies. Devaluation of the pound in 1967 failed to restore competitiveness, and the government introduced cuts, abolished free school milk, and backed US imperialism in Vietnam.
The Donovan Commission (1968) identified unofficial strikes as the central problem but opposed legal sanctions. In 1969, Barbara Castle’s white paper In Place of Strife proposed anti-union legislation, including cooling-off periods and fines, provoking massive opposition. The Liaison Committee for the Defence of Trade Unions, initiated by the Communist Party, called a national Day of Action on 8 December 1969, answered by over one million striking workers — the first political strike since the General Strike. On 1 May 1969, one-and-a-quarter million workers struck. By April 1970, the Bill had passed the Commons despite 55 Labour MPs voting against, but intense pressure from unions, trades councils, and shop stewards forced the government to abandon the legislation.
Meanwhile, pit closures accelerated: 62 pits closed in 1967-68, the workforce falling from 692,700 (1959) to 365,000 (1968), with the NUM leadership collaborating with the NCB. In October 1969, an unofficial strike over surface workers’ hours spread via flying pickets, involving over 130,000 miners; the NCB granted the wage demand in full. In 1970, a bitter strike at Pilkington Glass saw the rank and file replace shop stewards with a Rank and File Strike Committee. The GMWU bureaucracy and management colluded to defeat the action. The Socialist Workers Party urged a split from the GMWU, leading to the short-lived Glass and General Workers’ Union, which collapsed after victimisation. The text argues such splits weaken unity and strengthen the bureaucracy, whereas pressure from below eventually forced the GMWU to shift leftwards, with David Basnett replacing Lord Cooper in 1973 and strike pay rising dramatically.