04.01.1996

1926 - Great clash coming

From 'The Workers’ Weekly', paper of the CPGB, January 1 1926

NOT MUCH longer can the great clash of opposing forces in industry be put off.

This month the railwaymen have to decide whether to accept the decision of the National Wages Board and suffer defeat, or whether to reject it, come in with the other workers and fight for their programme.

In May - perhaps sooner - the miners will be called upon to defend their hours and wages, and to fight the system of district agreements that the Coal Commission will try to impose upon them.

Engineers cannot be fooled much longer into conferences that delay indefinitely their chance of securing a 20s [£1] rise.

Builders are faced in 1926 with a definite government attack on their wages and conditions by the decision to build steel houses at less than building rates.

Seamen are faced with the heavy task of joining together their forces into a fighting organisation to win back the £1 a month they lost last year.