The Socialist (May 06) - Britain: The 1926 General Strike

"It is a conflict which, if it is fought out to a conclusion can only end in the overthrow of parliamentary government or its decisive victory." - Winston Churchill

Eighty years ago the British working class moved into action in the greatest ever demonstration of its power. On 3 May 1926 a General Strike was declared. Industry and transport ground to a halt as millions struck in support of the miners who had been locked out.

There are rich lessons for today's trade union and socialist activists in the events of 80 years ago. What began as a dispute over pay and conditions for one million miners quickly became a major confrontation between the organised working class and the ruling class, which posed the question: who really runs society? The millions whose labour produces all wealth or the minority who profit from that labour?

The general strike went down to defeat not because the working class buckled. Rather they were betrayed by their leaders, who afraid of what they had unleashed, surrendered on the ninth day of the strike even as it gained further momentum.

Background to strike

In the aftermath of World War 0ne, there was a short-lived economic boom. This quickly came to an end and unemployment rose rapidly from 250,000 in the autumn of 1920 to 2 million in June 1921. The prevailing economic, social and political conditions led to a series of skirmishes and battles between the working class and the ruling class that culminated in the General Strike.

The Russian Revolution of October 1917 had a profound effect on the situation, inspiring a generation of militants and leading directly to the formation of the British Communist Party (CP). The British ruling class feared the example of October and intervened directly against Soviet Russia. In late 1920 however, the government was forced to back away from escalating its intervention as far as outright war by the threat of a General Strike.

As unemployment, rose the employers attacked wages and conditions and trade union membership fell. In the 1920's the miners comprised one sixth of the male workforce and nearly one fifth of all trade unionists. These facts and their militancy meant that they were right in the firing line when the bosses went on the offensive.

"Black Friday"

On 31 March 1921, the miners were locked out when they refused to accept pay cuts and an end to national bargaining. The miners had forged close links with the transport workers in the Triple Alliance of the Miners Federation (the Fed), the National Union of Railwaymen, and the dockers in the preceding years.

The Triple Alliance set 15 April as the date for strike action in support of the miners. Lloyd George's government prepared for a major confrontation. Troops were sent to the mining areas and the Emergency Powers Act was invoked.

On 15 April, forever known as Black Friday, J.H.Thomas, the leader of the NUR, announced there would be no Triple Alliance strike. Betrayed, the miners fought on alone for 11 weeks and their defeat was a defeat for the entire working class. By the end of 1921, six million workers had suffered pay cuts averaging six shillings a week.

"Disciple of Karl Marx"

During the early 1920's, there was a shift to the left in the unions. This shift left was accelerated by the work of the National Minority Movement (NMM), a rank and file body established in 1924 under the leadership of the Communist Party. The NMM aimed "not to organise independent revolutionary trade unions or to split revolutionary elements away from existing organisations affiliated to the TUC...but to convert the revolutionary minority within each industry into a revolutionary majority."

When the right wing leader of the Fed resigned in 1924, the Minority Movement supported the miners' agent for central Rhondda, Arthur James Cook, for the leadership. Cook had resigned from the CP in 1921 but still declared himself a "disciple of Karl Marx and a humble follower of Lenin."

Economic conditions deteriorated when the French withdrew from the Ruhr, German coal returned to the market and British exports slumped. The new Tory Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin, appointed Winston Churchill, a sworn enemy of the miners, as Chancellor of the Exchequer. In April 1925 he announced a return to the Gold Standard at pre-war parity with the dollar. This meant overvaluing the pound by 10%. In order to make up this overvaluation it would be workers’ wages and not bosses’ profits that would be slashed. This was stated clearly by Baldwin himself: "All the workers of this country have got to face a reduction of wages to help put industry on its feet."

Dockers mount a picket

On 30 June 1925, the mine owners demanded wage cuts, an increase in the working day and the abolition of the minimum wage. The miners appealed to the TUC for support and the TUC, fearing "unofficial fighting in all parts of the country" and "anarchy", immediately called an embargo on the movement of all coal. Within a day the government had retreated. It announced the establishment of a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the coal industry and agreed to provide subsidies to the coal owners for nine months.

The ruling class had bought time and used it well. Detailed plans were drawn up for the deployment of the army, navy, police and civil servants. A group of retired army and naval officers established a strikebreaking force, the "Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies", with government support. Food, coal and petrol were stockpiled. Regional Civil Commissioners were given dictatorial powers and were poised to assume their powers on the receipt of a one word telegram saying "ACTION!"

The organisations of the working class were less well prepared. The CP used its influence at the September 1925 TUC Conference to pass a motion which stated "this Congress declares that the trade union movement must organise to prepare the trade unions, in conjunction with the Party of the workers, to struggle for the overthrow of capitalism."

The right wing leaders of the unions had of course no intention of acting on this motion. And in late 1925 the State moved against the CP raiding its office and the offices of the Young Communist League and the National Minority Movement. Twelve CP leaders were arrested and charged with seditious libel and incitement of the armed forces to mutiny. Shortly afterwards they were convicted and sentenced to between six and twelve months in prison. They were thus removed from the scene throughout the lead up to the General Strike and during the Strike itself.

"Not a minute on the day, not a penny off the pay"

The Royal Commission report was released on 6 March 1926. It criticised the coal owners but came down firmly in support of wage cuts and the end of national bargaining. The TUC general council urged the miners to use the report as the basis for negotiations. The miners rejected the report however sticking to their position: "Not a minute on the day, not a penny off the pay".

On Saturday 1 May, one million miners were locked out. The TUC general council assumed responsibility for the dispute. It announced that the "front ranks" of the movement would be called out in support of the miners from midnight on 3 May and contacted the government for talks.

1,000,000 miners were locked out during the 1926 General Strike

On the Saturday evening the TUC met Baldwin. The government took a hard line and demanded nothing less than complete surrender. Negotiations continued as attempts were made to find a form of words acceptable to the TUC. At 11pm the miners' leaders joined the TUC in 11 Downing Street and together they rejected the deal on the table. Ernest Bevin of the TGWU began drawing up a compromise deal that the miners might find acceptable.

The talks were abruptly brought to a halt by Baldwin when news emerged that workers at the Daily Mail had walked out after refusing to print the paper's lead article "For King and Country". The TUC left Downing Street as the reluctant leaders of an imminent General Strike carrying a letter from the cabinet demanding "repudiation of the actions referred to that have already taken place, and an immediate and unconditional withdrawal of the instructions for a General Strike." They quickly scuttled back with a letter repudiating the printers' action but it was too late, Baldwin had gone to bed!

Bevin's compromise proposals were put to the miners’ executive and rejected by 12 votes to 6. The TUC however accepted the proposals and continued in their efforts to sell out the miners. The problem for the TUC was that the government wasn't interested, it would only accept a guarantee that the miners would accept a cut in wages and refused to open negotiations until the Strike was called off.

General Strike begins

At midnight 3 May the Strike began. A state of emergency was declared and the crisis was debated in Parliament. Baldwin announced that "we have been challenged with an alternative government....I do not think that all the leaders when they assented to ordering a General Strike fully realised that they were threatening the basis of ordered government, and going nearer to proclaiming civil war than we have been for centuries past...".

All army and navy leave was cancelled. Troops were sent to Scotland, London, South Wales and Lancashire. Warships docked in the Tyne, the Clyde, at Swansea, Barrow, Bristol and Cardiff. Winston Churchill began producing an anti-union rag, The British Gazette.

The strike was complete amongst transport workers. Only 15 out of 315 tube trains ran in London. Only 40 out of 4,400 buses were running in London. Printers, iron and steelworkers, chemical workers and the dockers were all solid.

Councils of Action, often based on Trades Councils, sprang up across the country. They organised permits for transport, picketing, entertainment and financial assistance for those in most need. In East Fife, a workers’ defence corps was organised. Initially consisting of 150, its ranks swelled to over 700 after clashes with the police.

The heroism of the working class was not matched by a clear sighted leadership which could have seen the struggle through to victory and which could have capitalised on the revolutionary potential of the movement. Even the best of the workers’ leaders, Cook, had no clear perspective and plan of action.

The young and inexperienced CP was tied to the trade union leaders through the Anglo-Russian Committee, a bloc between the Russian unions and the General Council of the TUC. It received direction from Karl Radek in Russia who argued "this is not a revolutionary movement. It is simply a wage dispute."

Wokers confront a strike breaker

It is true that the movement was not initially a revolutionary movement but it was much more than a simple dispute over wages. It involved a General Strike, Councils of Action (embryonic soviets), and in some parts of the country, like the north-east, almost a situation of dual power. Linking up the Councils of Action and strike committees would have laid the basis for a workers’ government. That would have meant taking the struggle from a defensive one in support of the miners, to an offensive one to change society. The TUC leaders of course were not even prepared to carry through the defensive battle.

As the Strike continued, a new promise to re-organise the mines was made by the Royal Commission, but it still insisted on a savage wage cut. The General Council backed the proposal. The miners rejected it.

The TUC were desperate for a way out. On 11 May, with the Strike still growing, it called it off, accepting the latest proposals. There was no guarantee that strikers would not be victimised and no promise of an end to the lock out. This was abject surrender. The government immediately announced it as such, declaring that it had "no power to compel employers to take back every man who has been on strike." The bosses immediately rammed home their advantage. There were sackings and wage cuts everywhere.

The miners were isolated again. The TUC refused to even arrange a levy for the miners. After a heroic struggle lasting seven months, the miners went back to work, on longer hours, with less pay and with no national agreement.

The ruling class could never have defeated the General Strike but for the treachery of the TUC leaders. J.R. Clynes of the General and Municipal Workers’ Union, agreed. "I do not fear on this subject to throw such weight as I have on the side of caution. I am not in fear of the capitalist class. The only class I fear is our own."

We can say with absolute certainty that future struggles of the working class will lead to General Strikes in Britain, and in Ireland, North and South. No matter what its initial aim, any General Strike raises the question of which class rules in society. It also poses the need for a revolutionary party with roots in the working class which is able to answer this question by leading the working class to power. This is a cardinal lesson of 1926. We must now re-dedicate ourselves to creating a leadership that will measure up to the future challenges which will face the workers’ movement.

To coincide with the book's launch The Socialist spoke to Peter [pictured below] about the lessons of the strike movement for today's generation of socialist fighters.

Q: Why have you written a book about the 1926 General Strike now?

A: One reason is in order to acquaint the new generation with these events, which are in danger of fading from the memory, given that it is 80 years since the General Strike. Also, while on the surface British society may appear to be different from the events of the General Strike, the underlying difficulties of British capitalism in this neo-liberal, globalised era point towards a mighty collision between the classes at some stage in the foreseeable future.

Peter Taaffe Also, the issue of the 'general strike' - in the first instance, for one day - has come back onto the agenda of the workers' movement today. When local government workers went on strike on 28 March this year, union leaders warned that it "would be the biggest since the General Strike", indicating that 1926 is still an important reference point for the British labour movement.

We have also seen recently the convulsive movements in France, in which the need for a general strike to defeat the Chirac government was raised.

The 1926 General Strike is the most important event in the history of the British working class. Not since the days of Chartism in the first half of the nineteenth century had the British ruling class been so shaken. In the titanic nine days of 3-12 May 1926 the organised working class came out in their millions in a generalised stoppage which posed all the fundamental issues of power.

Out of five-and-a-half million workers organised in trade unions, an estimated four million took strike action in waves or 'stages' and a million miners were locked out at any one time. They were confronting the Tory government of Stanley Baldwin which included in its ranks figures like Winston Churchill and Lord Birkenhead. They were determined to crush the strikers in the hope that this would defeat the working class as a whole.

At the head of the million-fold 'workers' army' stood the General Council of the Trades Union Congress (TUC). The right wing of this body, which today would be described as 'moderate', was represented by trade union leaders like JH Thomas of the rail workers' union (NUR), Walter Citrine, general secretary of the TUC, and the transport workers' union leader, Ernest Bevin. These figures in general stood for a policy of 'class compromise', which they believed could be achieved through negotiation with the employers and the government. Strike action was considered as a very last resort.

In 1926, however, their approach was totally ineffective. The gulf between the classes was too great. The mine owners - with the Tory government at their back - were determined to inflict savage reductions in wages and conditions.

The systematic attacks on workers in the whole preceding period prior to the General Strike had radicalised significant sections of the working class which, in turn, was reflected in a shift to the left in the unions.

Baldwin had spelt this out in 1925 in an interview with union leaders when he stated: "I mean all the workers of this country have got to take reduction of wages to help put industry on its feet." This led to the emergence of left-wing trade union leaders like A.J. (Arthur) Cook of the mineworkers, Alf Purcell of the furniture trades union and AB Swales of the Engineers union (AEU).

The right-wing trade union leaders were dragged reluctantly into the General Strike but were forced to do so because of the monumental pressure from below.

When the strike began, the response of the working class was immediate and massive. The wheels of industry ground to a halt. The arteries of Britain - its roads and railways - were choked and silent. All the carefully laid plans of the government to defeat the strike lay in ruins as the working class, kept in the dirt by capitalism, rose as in Shelley's poem - "rise like lions" - in a magnificent display of working-class power.

Faced with a powerful and embattled working class and unprepared for a showdown in 1925, the Tory government bought time on 'Red Friday' by proposing a nine-month subsidy to the coal industry. Like the retreat of Thatcher in 1981, who then took on the miners in 1984-85 when the Tory government was prepared, so the ruling class also then temporarily backtracked while they organised to crush the miners and thereby the working class.

Q: Could there have been a revolution in Britain at that time?

A: There were some elements of a revolutionary or pre-revolutionary situation in 1926. The working class created a network of 'Councils of Action' or 'Strike Committees'. In significant parts of the country, these bodies began to assume the role of a rival workers' 'government' to Baldwin and his local representatives - cars and lorries carried notices "with the permission of the TUC". This terrified the ruling class and the right-wing trade union leaders, particularly as with each day the enthusiasm of the strikers, the numbers coming out on strike and those clamouring to do so grew with an irresistible force.

What was missing, however, was a mass Marxist working-class party able to develop working-class power and its organs as a step towards the socialist transformation of society.

Q: What was the role of the newly-formed Communist Party? Did the Communist International have any influence on the strike?

A: The role of the young Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) in these events is also an important aspect of this book.

The Communist Party was a small but important party in 1926. As the British section of the Communist International (Comintern), its membership drew most of its support from workers who defended the Russian workers' state and who considered themselves as revolutionaries. Only fragments of this party now remain, with little influence inside the British labour movement.

The CP could have emerged from the General Strike greatly strengthened both in numbers and in influence. They failed to do this because of their mistaken policies. However, they were not entirely to blame for this. By the time of the General Strike the young militants of the Communist Party were misled by the mistaken policies of the Communist International (Comintern), then under the direction of Stalin and Bukharin.

Impatient at the slow development of the young CP, they exerted pressure which led to the formation of the Anglo-Russian Trade Union Committee. This was a bloc between the Russian trade unions and the General Council of the TUC, and particularly with its left wing. Only mild criticism was made of the leading Lefts, which did not adequately prepare the working class for the inevitable retreats that these lefts made during and after the General Strike.

Q: What part did the Labour Party play?

A: As with the right-wing trade union leaders, the Labour Party leadership of MacDonald played a pernicious role. Ramsay MacDonald, the Blair of his day, as Labour leader, strove might and main to prevent the General Strike and, when this failed, did everything in his power to sabotage it.

He was assisted by those right-wing trade union leaders such as JH Thomas, leader of the National Union of Railwaymen (NUR).

He was described by his rich admirers as "one of the best waltzers in London" and lived on the Astor estate, often sharing "Lord Derby's box on Grand National Day". MacDonald attacked the 'extreme Left', militants, combative trade unionism and socialism.

Q: Why did the TUC General Council betray the strike?

A: Because of the pressure of the working class, the TUC General Council could not avoid putting themselves at the head of this mighty movement. But they did this in order to call it off at the first convenient opportunity.

The right wing consciously prepared to sell out the General Strike. The left on the General Council, with the exception of Arthur Cook, the mineworkers' union leader, went along with the betrayal of the strike. They were reformists. They believed that society could be changed by incremental changes rather than a social rupture, which is what 1926 represented.

In a period of acute capitalist crisis, which Britain was experiencing in 1926, this meant that these leaders would inevitably capitulate. Inherent in reformism in such a period is betrayal. This applies not just to the right but also to most of the left leaders. They were politically inconsistent and unorganised against the right in the run-up to the General Strike. Therefore they capitulated to the pressure of the right during the General Strike.

Most of the bitterness, particularly in the militant heartlands of South Wales, Durham, Scotland, etc, was directed against some of these lefts who the Communist Party, unfortunately, had failed to seriously criticise.

A general strike in a period similar to 1926 poses the question of power. In effect, two governments are established but this cannot last for ever.

This element of 'dual power' had to be resolved either by a victory of the propertied classes, represented by the Baldwin government, or by the working class. Tied as they were to capitalist society, the General Council of the TUC bent the knee to capital.

Q: The strike was defeated because the TUC general council capitulated - was it a complete defeat for the working class?

A: The General Strike was a defeat and a serious one at that. The ruling class took their revenge; the mine owners, without any pity, were determined to inflict brutal sacrifices on the miners and sought in the process to crush union organisation in the pits. The Tory Lord Birkenhead boasted in private: "The discredit of the Miners' Federation is now complete."

The Economist put the total trade loss during the strike at between £300 million and £400 million. One hundred and sixty million working days were lost in strikes in 1926 as a whole.

However, the more politically developed sections of the working class began to draw far-reaching socialist or even revolutionary conclusions from this defeat. Even after this defeat, if the Comintern had broken with the Anglo-Russian Trade Union Committee and called for an organised left and socialist resistance to the capitulators of the General Council, then a powerful, conscious, Marxist movement could have been built in preparation for future battles.

This was not done as, incredibly, Stalin and Co., along with the British CP, continued to rub shoulders in the Anglo-Russian Trade Union Committee with the capitulators. This was at a time when the miners were locked out and starving.

Q: Is the working class more powerful today than it was in 1926? Could there be a general strike today or are those methods of struggle outmoded?

A: If you look at articles and letters that have appeared in The Guardian recently, the spokespersons of the capitalists are in no doubt that "a general strike is impossible" today [22 April 2006]. But Britain has gone to the brink of such a strike on a number of occasions since 1926. [Note: See below for Peter's letter to the Guardian rebutting this ridiculous claim]

In 1970, for instance, the newly elected Tory Prime Minister, Edward Heath, threatened the trade unions and the working class in a nationally televised broadcast with a 'general strike' unless they were prepared to come to heel and accept cuts in their rights and conditions.

In both 1972 and, particularly, in the 1974 miners' strike, the possibility of a general strike loomed. The strategists of capital have pondered the events of the past, have seen what happened in 1926 and are prepared, if necessary, to deploy the same means to defeat the working class.

In the 1980s, under Thatcher, the issue of a general strike to topple her government was again raised. In a similar situation, which could occur in Britain and in Europe in the next stage, the capitalists will be drawing on the lessons from the past. The working class, for its part, must also explore the events like 1926 to see how best to prepare for a similar situation in the future. We hope that this book will be a step towards realising that goal.

Q: The 1926 General Strike posed the question of who ran society, with local workers' committees controlling the distribution of goods etc. If there was a general strike in Britain today, would it be similar?

A: There are some differences between the situations in 1926 and even France 1968, and the situation today in Britain and Europe. This is particularly evident on the issue of the political outlook, or consciousness, of the working class, then and now.

In both 1926 and 1968, there was a widespread awareness and attraction to the ideas of socialism as the alternative to capitalism.

However, with the collapse of Stalinism, and with it the planned economies of Eastern Europe, the capitalists were able to pursue a huge campaign against 'socialism'. In the 1990s, this coincided with an economic boom and the lurch to the right of the trade union and Labour leaders. This has thrown back consciousness.

Also, the economic situation is not yet as severe as 1926, and 1968 took place, paradoxically, when the economic boom in France and elsewhere had not exhausted itself.

On the other hand, the capitalists will pursue their neo-liberal agenda relentlessly but they will be challenged by a resurgent labour movement. Inherent in this situation is therefore the possibility of a general strike.

Because of all these factors taken together, this will probably mean that power may not be posed immediately in the minds of the working class. A 'general strike' today therefore could initially take the form of warning strikes to exert mass pressure to extract concessions. But these would be staging posts along the way towards strikes like 1926. This is why this event retains its importance today.

At the same time, recent events in Nepal show how an almost classical general strike of the working class in the cities - supported by a mass peasant revolt in the rural areas - can develop even today. This strike posed starkly the question of power before the masses. But the general strike could not be maintained indefinitely unless power, including the formation of a workers and peasants' government, passed decisively into the hands of the masses.

Q: What would be the most important lessons that we could draw from the 1926 General Strike?

A: The General Strike of 1926 was a magnificent display of working-class power. The attempt to trivialise and belittle its significance by references to strikers playing football with policemen and other secondary features of the strike is meant to diminish it in the eyes of the present generation.

This is done quite consciously by capitalist historians together with the right-wing trade union leaders. They like to think that "never again" will a general strike occur in Britain. On the contrary, the situation that is developing in Britain will lead to a mighty collision, in fact a series of class conflicts between the classes which will put the issue of the general strike back onto the agenda.