and Benn in the Labour leadership elections. It is therefore important for militants to take a clear position.
None of the candidates in this election are prepared to take up the crucial issues facing the working class and to put forward the policies -nationalisation under workers control, automatic cost of living increases to compensate for inflation, a programme of public works, implementation of the demands of the Working Women's Charter - which can begin to provide an adequate solution to the crisis. pared to fight for even the minimal democratic right of the labour movement as a whole and not the parliamentary clique to decide the issue of the leadership through a special Labour Party conference.
Only a candidate pledged to these policies could show a real way forward. On the basis of their programmes alone, none of the present candidates qualify for a vote. Benn's platform, for instance, contains three main planks: more import controls, which would only boost prices here and export unemployment onto the backs of workers abroad; more Gov ernment control of investment through the National Enterprise Board, where the lessons of British Leyland in terms of redundancies and speedup are already clear; and more 'industrial democracy', which (again as at Leyland) means workers participating with management in decisions to cut their own jobs and living standards.
But one's position on an election can't be decided just by reference to adequate policies. It is necessary also to look at what social forces stand behind the candidates.
Labour despite the rottenness of its policies; when the only choice in the AUEW is between the Broad Left and the right, a vote has to be cast for the Broad Left though its policies don't come out clearly even against The Central Divide The immediate central divide in the labour movement today is for or against the central line of this Government. ing class movement is polarising. the policies of this Government and those who, however inadequately, are opposed to these policies, it is impossible to be neutral.
It is on this line of divide that the position of the two left' candidates, Foot and Benn, can be judged. Who stands behind Foot is clear. Certainly some workers who still remember his left reputation will support a vote for Foot. But Foot stands four square for the Government's policies. With him are the trade union bureaucrats who are the chief architects and pillars of this Government's policies. Indeed, Foot is the central linkman with the union bureaucrats in support of the Government's policies. A vote for Foot must be utterly rejected.
To take a position on Benn's candidature is more difficult. If one of the "lefts' who had voted against the £6 limit and refused to vote for the cuts was standing, the situation would be clear. Despite the inadequacy of their alternatives, they would clearly rally those opposed to the Government's policies.
Vote Benn - Just Benn, on the other hand, is pursuing the policy he has been following for the last nine months - to refuse to break with the Government, but to attempt to differentiate himself from it on some points while remaining a member of the Cabinet. bition is to become leader of the Labour Party — something he is very lik ely to achieve in the late 1970s. ernment's policies, and using it in his public campaign, Benn will appear to many workers as the one candidate in some way opposed to the Government's policies.
Even though he will probably later become the direct ally of Jones, Basnett, Scanion and the others at the moment he is not in alliance with them, and will undoubtedly attract around his candidature those opposed to the Government's policies. We cannot be neutral in a fight involving Nor are any of them pre In a general eleccon a vote as to be cast tol Around this divide the workIn a fight between those who are for We would not hesitate to call for support for such a He is a cowardly bureaucrat whose sold am But by opening up a crack with the Gov.
Under these circumstances it is correct, but only just correct