The Socialist Labour Party Fringe Meeting at the Prison Officers Association

Conference In Portsmouth 8^th May 2008.

Report by Phil Chambers

This meeting was convened by the South East Area of the SLP and was chaired by its Secretary Derek Issacs.

Liz Screen from the SLP National Executive spoke first primarily on what she said Arthur Scargill calls ‘The collaborationist tendency of the present Trade Union movement’. This with the continuing severe anti trade union laws has had a devastating effect on the working class. The TUC argue and work for the Labour Government and are rewarded by collusion with corporate, private sector greed and fear induced by the government. Cheap and casual labour, low wages, submissive workers and lower public morale is the result - with opposition reduced to all but a few.

South Wales SLP is at present activating against an evil company bent on building a massive military complex. 10% of prisons in the UK are private, the most in Europe, run by corporations for profit.

Liz Screen went on to say that industrial action is in fact no longer a right in Britain. The right to strike has become a legal obstacle course. Whilst bosses can closedown their businesses

In 1994 the POA has had its rights withdrawn by law by the Tory’s. Since then the deliberate promise by Tony Blair to restore them has been betrayed. Jack Straw should hang his head at the way he has treated the POA. Gordon Brown has said ‘’we have succeeded in tackling inflation we will do nothing to put that in jeopardy’’. This statement has been followed by massive bail outs for banks. The New Labour government’s policies are quite clear. 

Brian Caton General Secretary of the POA responded by saying that increasingly the prison officers were more akin to workers than the police. Blair had reneged on his promise but also his alternative, a pay review body (PRB) with arbitration had not delivered and the official Prison Service had showed little interest.

He had praise for Admiral Frere the Vice Chair of the PRB but the Director of Prisons had been obstructive. Frere had supported a 6.5% increase but was then sacked by the government. The new man Gerry Cope late a director of the Post Office was a government placement. This PRB was heavily weighed against the POA and its terms of reference can be changed by the Minister or Prime Minister the Prison Service had taken apart their new agreement to such an extent that the POA had taken its case to the International Labour Organisation. They had ruled that the Prison Officers could be restricted but mechanisms must be put in place to compensate.

The PRB had then been by-passed by another structure which was supposed to be more localised. This had had some successes but serious disputes had arisen in some prisons as local Governors made their own interpretations. Twelve months ago the POA had formally withdrawn from this agreement. He said balance was sought not imposition.

Brian Caton mentioned the historic strike on 29^th August 2007 that occurred due to this build up of grievances and the disgraceful way the POA was treated by Jack Straw and the government. Straw has gone further and attempted to legislate against working to regulations (work to rule) which even included the right to wear a POA badge with the words ‘’United We Stood 29^th August 2007’’written on it. Brian said that were the POA to stick to the official rules prisons would grind to a halt. There has been no training on human rights for Prison Officers, they are owed at least 520,000 hours of unpaid overtime and the arbitrary discipline system had only very recently led to another prison walk out in Yorkshire. The treatment of dedicated public servants in this country had been met with astonishment worldwide. This in the country that was supposed to be the seat of democracy.

John Hayball Secretary of Kingston and Surbiton CSLP then spoke. He said ‘’The day that we spent last year at Southport even only on the fringe of your Conference made one indelible mark on my memory. It was of a union in a state of seething discontent. We did not however imagine when we awoke on the morning of 29^th August 2007 that we would hear the media report that seething discontent had been converted into a national prison officer’s strike, the first in its history.

For me it was the best birthday present I could have had. I was born on 29^th August 1949, the day of the first Soviet nuclear test in Kazakhstan. Your strike was like a nuclear strike! It upset Jack Straw and the government above all. It upset the prison management and the media. No doubt it changed attitudes in the rest of the trade union movement. And it impacted on the Socialist Labour Party because it demonstrated the power of the prison officer in British society which many on the left had previously discounted or despised. It echoed back to the successful strike of the free National Union of Police and Prison Officers also on 29^th August 1918 which so rocked the establishment and the Liberal Party led by Lloyd George.

But we cannot dwell too long on the past but look to the future. In my experience there are two problems with strikes. One you have to clear up after them yourselves and in the case of Lancaster Farms there was quite a lot of clearing up to do. And secondly, and perhaps most importantly, it is always a question of the next strike. Will it be as successful as the last one? We have a similar problem in our political party. It is not just a question of this election but also of the one that follows and the one after that. It is like being on a treadmill. That is why it is so crucial for any trade union to have a strong political wing to effect a situation where the necessity to strike can become a thing of the past in a socialist society. That must be our vision. In fact the POA has never had a Member of Parliament.

Looking at your agenda for Conference 2008 I do not feel as though you have a set of political demands ready to impose on a political party. Which raises the question – where are the other political parties at this Conference? In particular I was shocked to learn earlier this year that the budget for prisons in this country is only £3 billion. I believe that the prison system bursting at the seams with 82,000 inmates we have a crisis on our hands that would warrant the elevation of that figure to as much as £5 billion to include the probation service. What do you say? The New Labour Government can find £50 billion for Northern Rock and the same figure again for the money markets. You must set a figure and demand that political parties adopt it.

It is contrary to Marxist principles to raise spending in the unproductive sector of the economy. Ken Livingstone dramatically increased the number of police officers in London which cost a lot of money but it has not solved the problem of crime. However never again should a situation arise as happened in Kilmarnock prison where a prisoner was murdered because of inadequate staffing. That has nothing to do with socialism. Currently our SLP policy commitment to the prison service is for free trade union rights. That must be changed by our triennial congress in Blackpool in November. Last year I made the suggestion to you of holding half yearly forums of all political parties who want to support the POA. I repeat that suggestion today for your reappraisal’’.

Ends.