'improvements' in the living conditions of black people in Britain's inner cities since the uprisings of 1980, 1981 and 1982 have been no more than synthetic and cosmetic.
The Labour Party Black Sections horrified at the deaths that occured we offer our condolences to the bereaved families. The Tory government stand indicted of criminal neglect of Britain's black communities.
So do Labour politicians who collaborate with pression by calling for leavier policing to solve the problem.
Labour-run Birm'partnership' authority which receives a tew extra crumbs • trom the government. The petty cash which has come to the area in this way has made no impact on urban decay, bad housing and a local economy which makes an exception be employed if you are young and black.
Seventy one per cent of black vouth aged between 16 and 20 are out of work because of the vicious divisive economic policies The right-wingers who control Birmingham City Council with the connivance of community godfathers have allowed themseives to Firefighters clear debris around the Lozells Road post office (left foreground) after the Handsworth revolt 'THE RECENT events in Handsworth, Birmingham have provided stark evidence that much-vaunted be manipulated by Thatcher.
Proportionately more money is lavished on leaty suburbs like Edgbaston than the inner city ghettos of Handsworth Sparkbrook. Yet we have heard hardly word Lorese inequalities deputy leader Roy Hattersley, MP for Sparkbrook, Shadow HOUSINE man Jeff Rooker, MP for Perry Barr, which covers Handsworth. was Rooker who called instead for more police.
We oppose the politics of 'containment' which mean more slush funds for *community projects' run by Ine goatainer matia heavier policing. BACK Declons the politics of power sharin We demand that black DCUDICI alienated participation in coll call politics because of past sell-outs like the passing of racist immigration laws, must be given real stake in the political structures of this What is needed •Will Ye are not bigger and badder police riot squads but policing by consent and under democratic control.
We do not need police drug squads. We do not need special police units set up to combat the evils of race attacks made on black people by fascist thugs. we need determination by local authorities, spearheaded by Labour, to evict racist tenants, not move the victims to even worse housing.
Time is running out for the politicians who oppose black rights in while mouthing platitudes about their position We mustand vill to apartheid Azania. be allowea to speak for ourselves about best our needs ana soron. are to be fulfilled. Handswort is a warming of the Fire Next Time in Brixton, BOTOTO Southall, 'Leicester, Moss Side, St Pauls. and ever other inner city area unless Ulat Britons fair slice of the economic, political and social cake.
Sharon Atkin, Chair Black Sections National Committee Amir Khan, Black Section organiser in Sparkbrook, Birmingham City Councillor Cars are overturned for barricades as black youth protest Douglas Hurd's visit British society.
Monday night.
black section, came with a delegation from tingham black section. He told Socialist Action: heard oday wace we first heard black people standing . to miseries of their life in Handsworth, some of us came immediately to Birmingham to get first-hand reports. the very first we realised that the police and the Tories, and even the leadership of the Labour Party, were all trying to use this issue, trying to play it as West Indian against Asian.
We were very concerned because we knew that it was only by standing united that we could win Those people who died were not attacked by • black youth as Asians. It happened because of the frustration of black young people because unemployment, because the police attitude towards them and policing in the area.
The black youth were attacking hsians. in that , not attacking Asians. particular area there are more thers. What than others. the media failed to report was that Asian youth took When we were laying the wreath we were saying that black people should be united; we were saying that the blame for those people who have died in the riots goes to the police and the state, and eadership of political par ties and not those black important nessage that Handsworth has brought home - and after Brixton this message came out - is that young THE LABOUR Party black section responded immediately to the uprising in Handsworth last week. They have issued a press statement highlighting the real causes of the events in Birmingham and calling for black unity against the institutional racism ol To make this point, on Friday a black section delegation laid a wreath at the Lozells Road post office where two Asian brothers died in the fire of HASSAN AHMED, chair of Nottingham East Notblack people are not going to put up with this situation anvmore. Since those four years nothing has nappened. no real ettorts have been made to change ine root-cause ot the problem do something about it.
Handsworth has sent a strong message that black people, and especially youth, in this country are not going to put up with these appalling conditions anymore. Something will have to be done And if people think that just by pleasing a few god fathers in the black community and creating a few more community centres, the problems are going to go away, well it's not.
I think also it sends a message to the leadership of the Labour Party. who have stood strongly against black sections, that black people are not going to be patronised anymore. They want an equal share, they meant their problems to be understood, they want equal participation, and they want the elimination of racism from this society. That's the argument, the message from Hand sworth from those black response of Rooker Kinnock has to do with Labour being first in the opinion polls. rour vears aro the Dolls were showing Labour at the bottom, but now Labour think they are going to be the majority party in the next parliament.
That is consistent with Labour's past record. When it comes to election campaigning they try to woo black workers, but in government they have introduced of the worst legislation in this country They think they're going to be the government, before even getting there they have started taking this attitude.
That proves again the been arguing: that these people do not understand our problem, they do not blem of black people. to understand the pro It's only with the participation of black people that we can actually get to ine roots of the problem and try to do something about Look at the attitude of Labour's leaders during the miners' strike. It was not the struggle of the miners that was important to them, it was the law and order issue.
And look at the attitude they've taken on South Africa for example They say Neil Kinnock has posing all the rugby tours what he hool with help actual struggle of South Africa?
If the Labour movement is going to show any real solidarity with the struggle of black people ir Africa then they should be supporting the ANC. They should be of for the practinst apar Anything less thar that to us is just showbusiness. That's what the labour movement has got to unactstand now.
To us the struggle o black CODIR snaker throughout the globe whether it's In EI Salvador, whether it's in South Africa, in the streets of Handsworth, or in Brixton.
Black people are at the receiving end all over and it's the imperial forces that oppressing and exploiting them. So for us Handsworth is not a one-off thing, it's interlinked.
What's happened at Handsworth makes more determined first to fight more fiercely for acceptance of the black sectionland to fight the issue racism within the Labour Party and within society. Second. important that the black section tried to understand this situation, these different events - whether it is Newham 7, Brixton or Handsworth and tries IO link themselves with the grassroots and more with activists in the street. We have to take up these struggles collectiveThat's the only way that we can keep this movement on the right political path That's how we can also avoid these at tacks like burning Asian shops as well. And that's ourselves in these sting only involving The black section in Nottingham has called a meeting locally and inviter Indians, West Indians, Pakistanis, all the munity leaders, to discus Handsworth: response, the media and the police and how should handle this in Not tingham In Hyson Green, Not tingham, there's been a lot i tension in the past t days aiter Handswortl We were expecting something to happen so we actually went there t them to talk to them about what our response should be if anything happens. and how we should avoid any attacks on cach other.
That should be the first response of black sections to get out and talk to the black community. talk to the young people make sure that if any struggle is on it's directed to the right peo ple, those responsible
Socialist Action 20 September 1985 local government elections of 1984 saw the most geographically polarised shifts in any elections in Britain for more than sixty years. tions within the working class could THE UPRISING in British politics. - David Owen.
the most The sharply increasing differentiaBritish capitalism.
A never undone. But at the