Stand Up, Say It Loud; I'm Working Class And I'm Proud

When I left school, I went to work for my local Council. They sent me to College on Day Release to do a course called “Public Administration”. One of the subjects was Sociology. About the only thing I can remember from it, was to do with class. It repeated the subjective, bourgeois sociological view that we are all Middle-Class now, because we all have nice homes, a car, take foreign holidays, and so on (this was back in 1970). I remember making the point, which the slightly Left of centre lecturer took on board, that maybe the opposite was true. Maybe it meant we were all now working-class.

After all, many of the vocations that in Marx's time would have been considered middle class, such as teaching, office work and so on, no longer had the prestige they once did, the workers who did them, were in trades unions and so on. But, of course, there have been repeated attempts to argue either that the working-class does not exist, or that it has become embourgeoisified. In the US, working-class is a term that virtually does not exist. Ordinary working-class people there are routinely termed “middle-class”. If anything, in the US, working-class is ironically used as a term to describe those who do not work, the chronically unemployed, and urban poor. Similarly, when John Prescott did a TV series a while ago on the issue of class, he came across the young unemployed woman, living on a council estate, who believed she must be middle class, because, she reasoned, she couldn't be working-class given that she didn't work!

The embourgeoisement thesis originated in the US. It was also introduced into the UK in the 1960's by Richard Rose, and Mark Alexander Abrams in their book, “Must Labour Lose?” The notion was fairly comprehensively disproved by J.H. Goldthorpe in his work “The Affluent Worker In The Class Structure”.  Goldthorpe et al looked at some of the most affluent workers in Britain, those employed at the Cowley car factory. He demonstrated that their higher wages and status had no meaningful effect on their class affiliation, or political support for Labour.

However, developments in the last forty years, and in particular the development of what Shirley Williams and others have described as an “under class” - what Marx termed the Lumpen Proletariat – made up of the chronically unemployed, and unemployable, those existing on the margins of paid work in perpetual casual work (frequently within the Black Economy), involved in petty crime etc., give reason to question the relation of this group to the working-class itself.

The riots of last week, give particular reason for such an investigation, and to examine how socialists should relate to this section of society, and how immediate practical solutions to its problems might be developed.

Most of the off-the-peg solutions put forward by Liberals, and by most sections of the Left rely on platitudes, and the repetition of past failed solutions. They hinge around calls for the capitalist state to intervene, which in many ways are just the other side of the coin to those put forward by the conservative and reactionary politicians. The latter see the answer lying with the capitalist ctate in the form of a strong state response through more and tougher policing, harsher gaol sentences and so on, whilst the former show an equal amount of faith in that capitalist ctate to provide a solution through redistributive tax policies, the provision of additional Welfare Benefits, or increased Public Expenditure in various forms.

Neither, of these solutions offers anything in the way of an independent, working-class solution. Both reinforce, the idea of working-class subordination to Capital. The conservative/reactionary position does so by stressing repression, and the need for these sections of society to get a job, any job, at whatever pay or conditions, and for the need to reduce benefits to encourage that. The Liberal/Left position implies that workers are by nature dependent on capital – either private capital or state capital – and that all they can do is to make impassioned pleas to it, rather like Oliver Twist asking the Beadle for more gruel, to ease their plight.

It suggests that workers can only work, if capital allows them to do so. That may be true if we take the capitalist system as a whole, but, of course, the whole point about a Marxist response, is that we do not accept that state of affairs as being natural or eternal, and seek to challenge it, thereby challenging capital, and the capital-labour relation in the process of doing so.

The whole point of a Marxist strategy, here and now, is not to act in ways which reinforce and reproduce the dependence of labour upon capital, but to seek to subvert that relation and that dependency, including the crippling dependency of these groups in particular on the capitalist state. In so doing, our task is to also enable the working-class to get up off its knees, to fill it with class pride, as a necessary step in the process of developing a revolutionary class consciousness.

It requires a sharp break with some of the Lassallean/Fabian ideas that have dominated the Labour Movement for more than a century.

In previous posts I have demonstrated how, as Engels had pointed out, by the end of the 19th Century, Big Capital dominated, and had established as its method of domination an essentially social-democratic consensus. In the shape of Fordism, this came to be the dominant regime of Capital Accumulation, particularly after WWII. Its basis was the idea that workers would be bought off for enduring boring jobs, by being provided with steadily rising real wages made possible by the ever rising levels of productivity that Fordist production techniques brought with them. It was manifest in the idea of “mutuality” embodied in Trades Union Collective Bargaining agreements, particularly in the car industry. But, alongside this also went the development of the Welfare State, which acted in a similar way to buy off workers via a social wage, whilst ensuring that Capital got the reproduction of the kind of labour-power it required.

In many ways that also fitted with the ideas of “scientific-management” put forward by the Taylorists, whose ideas were necessary for the implementation of Fordist production methods. Taylor had recognised the advantages of planning as he witnessed it in the USSR – in return, Lenin (as well as Gramsci), also sought to employ Taylorist techniques in the USSR – though he was an opponent of Communism. Taylor sought to introduce these planning ideas into the factory, in place of the ad hoc methods of the existing management. But, it was not long before the Taylorists also recognised that what was good for the factory also applied to society as a whole.

The Welfare State, and other forms of intervention by the capitalist state fitted well with their ideas, and before long the trades unions sought to use the Taylorists criticisms of bad managements to demand a greater say in management, and particularly to raise the idea of trades unions involvement in national planning. In this way the trades unions were easily incorporated into this relation by which the subordination of labour to capital was effected, with the workers being bought off.

In the 1920's followers of Taylor such as Tugwell, as well as other Liberals such as Hobson, had warned that the excess profitability caused by Fordism, and Taylorist methods would result in a crisis. Their ideas chimed perfectly with those of Keynes for the capitalist state to intervene in this process, and for increased state planning of the economy.

In the US, Stuart Chase, in his book, “A New Deal”, which provided the name used by Roosevelt, argued “Why should the Russians have all the fun of remaking a world?” Roosevelt's programme was emblematic of this social-democratic consensus around, which big capital was creating a new regime of accumulation. Werner Bonefield, argues,

“Thus, the specifically Fordist form of the state is the Keynesian corporatist, statist, welfare state (Esser/Hirsch/Roth) which, in the long run, was transformed into the Fordist social security state (Hirsch, 1980; 1983b)”

See: “Reformulation of State Theory” in Capital & Class 33, Winter 1987.

As he says, the means by which the Fordist, capitalist state, achieves this is by infiltrating into every aspect of social life.

I wish to argue that a socialist strategy cannot be based around accepting that role of the capitalist state, but can only be based around developing a truly independent working-class, organising to stand on its own two feet, in militant opposition to that state, and cutting itself free from all dependence upon it. I intend to argue that a look at some of the lessons of the Black Power Movement in the US in the 1960's, and 1970's can provide some lessons for how that can be achieved, as well as pointing to some of the mistakes that need to be avoided.

James Brown's “I'm Black & I'm Proud” was emblematic of that idea of Black Pride, and empowerment. In the lyrics, he talks about black people having worked for someone else for too long, but he also goes on to talk about self-empowerment, a theme also covered in his song “I Don't Want Nobody To Give Me Nothing (Open Up The Door I'll Get It Myself)".  In fact, many of the ideas go back to those of Marcus Garvey, who argued that there should be a separate state for blacks in the US, so that they could build their own self-reliance on the basis of self-determination.

That idea is also covered in another song from the time by Brown, “Funky President”, in which he talks about the idea of getting some land, so that they could “raise our food, like the Man”.

By the 1960's, the idea of a separate Black State in the US, was a reactionary demand. By that time blacks had become a powerful, integrated element of the US working class. Despite the massive racism they faced, seeking to divide the working-class in that way, would have been a backward step, as, in fact, the history since that time has demonstrated.

In the 1930's, many blacks did have “some land”, but only on the basis of Sharecropping, which essentially reduced them to the state of a medieval peasant, and worse given the huge debt burdens they faced. That demand in Brown's song should not be taken, then, too literally. It merely signified the idea of building up black businesses, and independence from “The Man” i.e. the predominantly white capitalist class.

But, as Stokely Carmichael, pointed out, that would not be sufficient, it also meant building up a Black political force too, that could advocate their needs. And whilst Carmichael advocated nationalism, others such as the Black Panthers did not.

Bobby Seale, argued that the oppression of black people was more of a result of economic exploitation than anything innately racist. In his book "Seize the Time", he states that,

"In our view it is a class struggle between the massive proletarian working class and the small, minority ruling class.

Working-class people of all colours must unite against the exploitative, oppressive ruling class. So let me emphasize again -- we believe our fight is a class struggle and not a race struggle."

But, as Marx had long before demonstrated the only way to truly change that condition of exploitation was by workers themselves becoming the owners of the means of production. Any hope of changing that situation without doing that by, for example, attempting to redistribute via the tax and benefits system was doomed to failure. Not only is there no reason why a capitalist state would do that, other than by redistributing within the working-class and middle-class, but any attempt by, say, a Left Government, would simply result in capital slowing down its rate of accumulation, replacing labour with machines etc. - or simply locating to some other country – thereby raising unemployment, reducing the demand for labour-power, with a consequent fall in wages, and redistribution back to capital.

Marx's solution was for workers to set up co-operatives where they could, but to also develop their own party to represent their political interests as capital fought to limit the role of the Workers' Co-operative property. Ultimately, as this class struggle between workers property, and capitalist property became ever more open and transparent as a political struggle, the workers would be forced to assume political power themselves, thereby opening up the road to the gradual transformation of the entire economy into a Worker Owned Co-operative Commonwealth.

As part of the Black Power movement in the US, the ideas contained in Brown's songs, and in the ideas of the movement about Black empowerment, pride, and self-determination became reflected in a growing movement within Black communities to develop black businesses, and to find both workers and consumers for those businesses from within the Black community itself.

The extent of the success of that can be seen by the fact that, as this article points out, there are now over a million Black businesses in the US, with $100 billion in sales. It says, Black GDP, in the US, now stands at $1 trillion.

But, the weakness is obvious. The majority of these Black businesses, having been formed, at least in part, in opposition to “The Man”, simply became "The Man" with a black face. They were set up as black, private capitalist enterprises, and so to the extent that they became successful they simply replicated the Capital-Labour relation of white capitalism. As Seale had pointed out, it was not racism that stood behind the exploitation of Blacks, but capitalism. Some Black co-operatives were established, but without being part of a wider co-operative movement, capable of providing access to capital, of enabling extended trade within a growing co-operative sector, and of facilitating production on a large enough scale, they would always be susceptible to falling to the fate of all small businesses trying to compete in a hostile capitalist environment.

But, Black Power, did succeed in raising awareness within the Black community, and of instilling some sense of the idea “I'm Black, And I'm Proud”. Even if all too grimly, today, a large number of Black people – now joined also by many Hispanics – continue to live as an under class, in desperate poverty in the richest country on the planet, and in a condition of dependency on the capitalist state, the ideas of Black Power in the 1960's, did offer a way out of that, at least for a time, that did not rely on appeals to the capitalist state, or in calls for "Revolution Now". It is those ideas of self-reliance, community organising, the building of cultural and class pride that I think we need to take up, and develop today; not as Black pride, but as Working-Class pride. That was also the point I was trying to make in my blog Why We Need A Tomb Of The Unknown Worker.

In the deprived inner city areas. the answer is not to look to the capitalist state for solutions, not too simply address the problem of welfare dependency, by increasing the dose of that particular opium of the people, but to provide independent, working-class solutions built around the idea of working-class self-activity, self-government and class pride. In response to the plea that “there are no jobs”, we should respond, not by demanding that the capitalist state provide such jobs, or else provides welfare benefits, nor by perpetuating the myth that such jobs can only be generated by the good grace of private capitalists.

We should proceed on the basis of the fundamental idea of Socialism that if there are unmet human needs, and there are unused resources, the two can be beneficially brought together. In the last week or so, we have seen large numbers of people in these communities come together to form Defence Squads to protect themselves against rioting and looting. We have also seen people organise themselves in large numbers – much larger than the numbers of looters – via social networking to carry out the clean-up of those communities for example.

This is ample proof that local communities can self-organise, and can undertake work themselves without private capitalists and without the capitalist state. It was a clear refutation to the argument sometimes raised that workers in these communities cannot take on such functions, because they have a job to go to, and so on. Whilst most of the rioters were without work, the majority of those that turned out to clean-up, did so in addition to having a job to go to. How much greater reason then is there to provide those without work, with a job doing those tasks within the community that need doing, tasks often whose main beneficiaries are those that do not have jobs, and who are dependent upon some form of assistance? I am not talking about Workfare here, which is simply a means by which the capitalist class uses the Welfare State to reinforce the Capital-Labour relation, but of subverting that relation.

I am talking about local communities establishing their own direct democracy, to decide on tasks within the community that need doing, and providing the unemployed members of that community with work doing them.

It would involve establishing co-operative enterprises within the community to undertake that work. It could involve carrying out things such as Drug Counselling, for instance, where some professional knowledge would be required – possibly utilising workers from the Co-op Pharmacy – but, through which some of the unemployed could then also be trained appropriately.

It could involve reclaiming and developing, into inner city farms and gardens, derelict land. Indeed, it could involve building much needed social housing. The communities themselves would need to raise capital to begin to organise these types of activity, but there are a number of ways this could be done such as access to funds from the Co-operative Development Agency, The Co-op Bank, The Confederation of Co-operative Housing, and so on, as well as local workers raising their own funds, and by looking to their trades unions for support.

Moreover, the basic economic law is that where someone is paid to carry out work to meet the needs of some consumer, the income then received enables that worker to also expand their own needs, thereby creating demand for some other product or service, which in turn creates employment potential. Within the confines of capitalist production, the scope for this is limited, because a capitalist will only employ such workers if they can, at the same time, make a profit from doing so. But, a co-operative community enterprise would have no such limitation. Its only concern would be to ensure that needs are met.

Of course, this may mean that those employed to carry out the work might not be paid trades union rates of pay. But lots of work is carried out without it being done at trades union rates. Workers carry out domestic labour of that sort all the time. We should treat labour done for the benefit of our own communities, and to develop an alternative sector of worker owned property in the same way. After all the work that activists do, which requires considerable amounts of time, going to trade union branch meetings, LP meetings of all kinds, attending various campaign meetings and activities, is all done without any payment at all. We do it, because our concern is not primarily about payment, but about changing society, and as Marx demonstrated a fundamental aspect of that is changing those basic property relations. Our goal should not be limited by merely trades union politics, of the “Fair Day's Wage” variety, but be based on the socialist principle of abolishing the wages system, and of developing worker owned property as the means to do it. After all, a Workers State would have to abolish Welfarism, and seek to employ all available labour at whatever wages ensured competitiveness if it was to survive long in a hostile capitalist environment. As Marx said in the Critique of the Gotha Programme, our principle, the principle upon which Socialism is based is “He who does not work, neither shall he eat.”

But, the more such worker owned property was developed in our communities, the more it was linked together, the more competitive it would become against capitalist property. As the Mondragon Co-op in Spain has demonstrated, co-operative production is innately more efficient than capitalist production, and thereby provides the basis, in any case, of providing the workers within it with higher living standards.

The graph here shows the rapid rate at which Mondragon has created new jobs, and I have referred previously to the fact that workers at Mondragon receive pensions way beyond anything that workers in the UK can expect.

Many of those involved in the riots were themselves entrepreneurial. The gang members, and those involved in selling drugs were already essentially businessmen. Our task is to take that entrepreneurial spirit, and direct it into socially useful and positive directions, for the benefit of those communities.

Defence Squads Stopped The Riots, Now Make Them Permanent

The police and politicians are claiming that it is them that have brought the riots and looting to an end. That is nonsense. In London, its true that the level of policing was increased from 6,000 to 16,000, but the riots were not just taking place in London. Given that police were being taken off the streets of Manchester, Leeds, and other cities where riots had also occurred, you would then have expected that rioting in these areas would have increased had the account of the police and politicians been true. It didn't. Moreover, London is an area of around 1800 square miles. Even 16,000 police on the streets comes to just 10 police per square mile.

Given that the gangs of looters were springing up quickly, distracting police to one area by lighting fires, and then looting in another area, given that we now know from the figures of those going through the Courts, that 75% of those involved were looting in areas outside their own, it is clear that even with 16,000 police the looters could have run rings around them. The real reason the riots ended was that ordinary people, like the Turkish and Kurdish workers and shopkeepers of Dalston in London, or the ordinary workers in Birmingham, where unfortunately three young workers were killed by the thugs, were organising themselves to defend their communities. That completely reversed the situation.

Now it meant the thugs and looters did not know if they were going to go into an area where they would end up getting a good kicking from local workers. There are lots of reasons why the lesson from this is that we should now make these local Workers Defence Squads permanent, why we should extend them across the country, and why we should demand they be put on a legal footing, and brought under local democratic control.

For one thing, as one Irish worker in Enfield who had organised with some of his neighbours to defend the area and the petrol station put it, the police are part of the problem. It was the shooting of Mark Duggan in Tottenham that provided an initial spark for the rioting, that was then utilised by opportunist thieves and gangs. But, it has also been a return of more oppressive police tactics, such as the return of stop and search – which helped provoke the riots of the 1980's – which has provided additional fuel to the fire that created some of the momentum for these riots.

In reality, that is inevitable given the nature of the Police and its role. The usual description of the role of the Police adopted by the Left is that it is to protect private, particularly Capitalist, property. But, in reality this is not true. It is not true, because the nature of criminal activity against property is such that preventing it is near impossible. Instead, private property is reimbursed by insurance companies where theft or damage occurs, and the role of the Police is then to detect, rather than to protect. They concentrate on finding the criminals after the event, and bringing them to trial, thereby protecting private property only in the sense that known criminals get locked up, and future criminals are potentially deterred. If Police do actually prevent or protect property from criminal activity, it is almost always due to either good fortune of being in the right place at the right time, or else it is a result of police intelligence, which is almost exclusively geared towards the organised criminal gangs, engaged in the more serious forms of crime. But, the majority of crime is committed ad hoc, by opportunist criminals.

It is like having a large army geared to set piece battles trying to deal with groups of marauding guerillas. As a consequence, the only possible means of acting in a preventive manner is to adopt ever more repressive measures targeted at those communities, where the guerillas/criminals are seen as being based, and at least to an extent given support. All experience of such tactics is that it can only ever alienate the community as a whole against which such tactics are adopted.

A look at the experience of the riots, demonstrates this. Instead of trying to prevent the rioting and looting, in most cases, the Police largely stood back. Then they carried out their normal policing function of detecting. They trawled through masses of CCTV and other film footage, to identify the criminals, and then went to arrest them, and process them through the Courts. No doubt an efficient use of resources from their standpoint, but hardly comfort, for the worker out of a job, because their place of work has been torched, or for the worker burnt out of their home, or for the small shopkeeper whose livelihood has been destroyed, or for the victim of thuggery left dead or badly injured!

But, also from a working-class standpoint, the adoption of these kinds of repressive measures are inherently against our immediate and longer term interests. The same kinds of repressive methods used in, exclusively working-class communities, to supposedly prevent petty-crime etc. are also extended into the use of under cover officers, such as those used to infiltrate the environmental movement, and which have always been used to infiltrate the Labour Movement. One former head of Special Branch admitted on a TV programme a few years ago, that during the 1970's, and 80's they had 200 top Trade Union officials on their books as informants, for instance.

But, those kinds of repressive measures, and the laws built up around them, were also used during the Miners Strike, to swamp Mining Communities, to prevent free movement of strikers etc., and they have been used in many other disputes to the same effect, and for the same ends. Of course, it is these kinds of large scale, class confrontations, fought out between contending armies that the police are really set up to address. It is in that sense that they truly perform their function as the defenders of Capitalist property, and interests.

So, as workers, we have no interest in paying for the force that effectively oppresses us, and acts in the interests of the bosses against us. Still less, when as was shown clearly with the riots, that force is incapable of providing us with any kind of meaningful defence when it is actually required, even against literally a handful of thugs and looters. But, the riots are only a clear example of that. Every worker who lives on an estate where these same kinds of anti-social elements exist – and that is most working-class communities – has seen this kind of approach from the Police repeated a thousand times. They engage in all kinds of social activities that should really be the function of Social Workers and Youth Workers, and of the Local Council, but when it comes to dealing with the thugs, they are usually missing. The classic experience is that when the Police are called to some outbreak of anti-social or criminal activity, they arrive 20 minutes too late, with sirens blaring, so that the criminals have plenty of time to make their escape!

And, this just gets repeated over and over again. There are now many organisations who are involved with the Disabled, who are reporting an increasing number of attacks by thugs on Disabled people. Such attacks have, of course, been a feature of life for many Black and Asian people for decades. But, the nature of the Police as set out above is not at all geared to dealing with this kind of activity.

Only when some serious offence has occurred is the nature of the Police, and of the Law, geared to an adequate response. But, for the individual or family that has been killed or driven to suicide by years of abuse, and low level of aggravation, that the Police have simply ignored, or taken no serious action to stop, that is way too late. That was the case for example with Fiona Pilkington and her daughter.

As, the Irish worker from Enfield put it, the real answer is not to criminalise the young people involved, but for the local community to organise itself, to prevent the anti-social behaviour, and petty-criminal behaviour itself, by controlling those elements – old and young – giving them a clip around the ear, and sending them on their way. That is the way, working-class communities always used to police themselves in the past, before the middle class Liberals persuaded them to put their faith in the Capitalist State. And, of course, those same woolly minded, middle-class Liberals, who often live far removed from such activities, in their leafy suburbs, would be the first to complain about such a working-class response, preferring instead to protect the civil liberties, and human rights of the individual thug or petty criminal.

On the BBC's “Question Time”, those kinds of wooly minded Liberal ideas were well represented. Asked if “vigilantism” was justified, only John Prescott came close to giving a decent answer. Former top cop, and Liberal candidate for London Mayor, Brian Paddick, ridiculously said, what about those who are vulnerable, and can't defend themselves like my 92 year old Mother. But, of course, the whole point about a working-class, collective response, is that it DOES NOT depend upon individuals being able to defend themselves, precisely because it is collective! No one would suggest that the old and frail should go out on the streets, baseball bat in hand – though there are undoubtedly, things that those not able to do that could do, behind the scenes. Tory David Davies, equally, was keen to place things on an individualist rather than collective basis, arguing that it would be wrong for such groups to go out looking for trouble, but that individuals had the right to defend their own property.

Prescott, argued that people had set up their own defence because the Police had failed to protect them, and they had every right to do so. Meanwhile, vicar John Sentanu, opined that, such groups could be infiltrated by the EDL, or that even the Mafia might set itself up to provide “protection”. Of course, it is possible that the EDL or other unsavoury elements might infiltrate them. But, they might also infiltrate the local Church, would he then propose closing all Churches to avoid that possibility! There have after all been vicars who have been BNP supporters. In reality, any organisation in Civil Society could be taken over by some small group if the majority of ordinary people do not participate in it, and ensure that it is reflective of their interests. But, on that basis we would ban all organisations within Civil Society. Moreover, if ordinary workers are not to be trusted to be able to run even these limited aspects of their lives, then why would he think that these same ordinary workers are fit to have the vote, because after all they might make equally irresponsible decisions about who they elect. In reality, it is the same old claims, and belief that only they are fit to rule and tell workers what they should do, what they should think, and how they should behave that has always been purveyed by those within the elite, the Church above all.

In fact, where the EDL did try to take advantage of the situation and entered Eltham in London, the local community shunned them. After drinking for most of the day, the EDL ended up in a battle itself with the Police! But, the real answer to these groups trying to use local Workers Defence Squads for their own purpose is to ensure that they are regularised, and set up on a proper footing.

In many parts of the world that is not seen as any big deal. In Switzerland, for instance, there is not a regular army, but a Citizen Militia. In the US, the Constitution, establishes the principle of such a Militia. It sets out the right of all citizens, as part of this Militia, to bear arms to defend their communities.

If it is right, and to be welcomed for armies of workers to go out broom and pan in hand to clean up after the thugs and looters, then it must also be right for similar armies of workers to prevent the thugs and looters doing that damage in the first place, and instead of relying on the Police or the Council banning the thugs of the EDL, it is also the way of local communities preventing them from running rampage too.

It is the basis upon, which ordinary workers can take back control of their estates and communities, and that important part of their lives. It is the way of stopping the kind of anti-social behaviour that led to the death of Fiona Pilington before it can take root.

After all, in Britain, ever citizen is required by Law to perform Jury Service periodically. Is it not then only sensible that a similar responsibility should require them to engage in patrolling and protecting their communities on a rota basis, to prevent the crimes that end up in the Courts, in the first place. The Tories in the Parliamentary debate spoke at length about Responsibilities, so they should then have no objection to enshrining in law, such a responsibility of every able-bodied citizen from taking part in such activity.

Employers currently are obliged to pay the wages of their workers who serve on Jury Service. A law establishing such local Workers Defence Squads, should then also require employers to pay the wages of their workers when they are engaged in such duties, including for training to perform them.

In the meantime, the Labour Movement should learn the lessons of the riots, and of the Defence Squads that were set up. Local Trades Councils, and TRA's, as well as local Labour Parties should begin to establish such Squads throughout the country, and begin to link them together in an organised and democratic structure. Within communities, TRA's and other such organisations need to be broadened out to provide, real, direct democratic control over the community, based on active involvement, as opposed to the sham of bourgeois democracy that only requires them to vote every four or five years, for a Councillor. These local Neighbourhood Committees, can then act to exercise real day to day democratic control over the Defence Squads, ensuring that they are directed to meeting the needs of the community, addressing its concerns, and preventing the fascists, and other such groups from infiltrating, and dominating them for their own political purposes.

The riots have once again shown that workers cannot and should not rely on the bosses' State. We have to take back control of our lives, and exercise that control collectively through our own organisations and activity.