It's nice that Richard Flint is willing to engage in a friendly dialogue. It would be even nicer if he would speak the truth.
Flint writes "I should make it clear that our position (which was also the position of the Transport & General workers' Union) was that no solidarity action should take place while we were awaiting the results of the dockers' ballot on a company offer. It is true that the dockers' mass meeting had rejected the offer by show of hands, but the ITF and TGWU wanted to wait for the results of the ballot. When those results came in, we communicated this to our affiliates and requested further support." The last sentence is false.
In fact, on completion of the ballot in early February the ITF and TGWU agreed that ITF would not request its affiliates to act, and ITF Dockers Section Secretary Kees Marges cited this agreement as the reason why an ITF inspector must not participate in the impending international dockers conference in Liverpool.
Richard Flint knew this when he drafted the passage quoted above, if only because the evidence was given in the article to which he was replying!
The ballot result was known by the stewards on Wednesday 7 Feb, and the detailed figures were phoned through to them on the morning of Thursday 8 Feb. On Thursday 15 Feb Marges wrote to the ITF inspector referring to a meeting between the ITF General Secretary and a T&G representative "at the end of last week". The meeting therefore took place after the ballot result was known. At the meeting the T&G "confirmed again very strongly" that it "has not requested the ITF to initiate or organise supportive actions by affiliated Dock Workers and Seafarers Unions". The two organisations agreed "that ITF will not send a request to its affiliates asking them to organise or initiate supportive actions". Marges instructed the inspector not to attend the Liverpool conference because "Participating by an ITF Inspector in the meeting in Liverpool would be a violation of this agreement..."
In my opinion, the ITF was desperate to reassert control over international organisation, a control which was threatened by its own inability to respond to the Liverpool dispute. Immediately after the February conference, the ITF was bombarded with criticism. It was at that point that Richard Flint replied sweetly to Chris Bailey's blunt question: will the ITF publicise the dockers web site?
So now we're engaged in a dialogue. Could Richard Flint tell us why the ITF reacted to the 4-1 ballot rejection of Mersey Docks offer in early February by agreeing not to request its affiliates to act and by instructing one of its own inspectors not to attend the international conference in Liverpool?
Kevin Brandstatter is mainly concerned with more general issues of principle and has my sympathy, but I would like to comment on his impression that the Liverpool dockers have relied on the T&GWU to use the ITF, with predictable results. Quite the opposite.
The dockers made extensive direct contacts at rank and file as well as official levels with ports trading with Liverpool, seeking industrial action independently of the T&GWU or ITF. Kevin might wish that all ports were organised by maritime unions controlled by their own rank and file, who were committed internationalists and would take action as soon as they heard the word from Liverpool. Fine. But the dockers have had to fight in the situation they actually confront today.
In reality, many of the key unions are ITF affiliates. There are ports like Sydney where the ITF affiliated Maritime Union of Australia has been prepared to act without hesitation. But this is not true everywhere. In some ports, the attitude of the ITF is critical to the response that the union structures make to requests for action. The members, who are mainly not revolutionaries, want to know that their existing union will defend them if they get sacked after boycotting trade with Liverpool.
If the ITF is handing unions a good excuse to avoid industrial action, the Liverpool dockers can not respond merely by wishing they had an organisational alternative which would take years to construct. Conversely, the Liverpool fight is one of many that will have to be won in order that an effective international dockers alliance, let alone an international maritime union, can be formed in reality rather than simply imagined.
Greg Dropkin
