ITERNATIONAL WOMEN'S Day will be celeared differently this year than at any other time in the * 17 years. The centre of the activity will be the 9 arch rally in Chesterfield organised by the Women ainst Pit Closures movement. This is testimony not to the key role that en have played in susing their communities participating side-bywith the miners in every ect of the strike over the * stage in the upsurge of tue ement.
The Women Against Pit movement is the st powerful expression of rocess of radicalisation ag working women that been developing over the wo decades in Britain. when the Hord machinist: act for equal pay in 1968 this process. working followed. At SEIS.
Hoover's LILS year the battle over equal regrading Women fought for recognition at GrunJeans and Timex and of school meals and Casure of hose battles reflected •at wouch were ing the gains of the cars be taken them easily.
social position had ed and they were not to allow their econindependence to only pear without a fight.
Women did not wish to a to the kitchen sink I they could not afford to. easingly ene women only welc dwinners, their breadvital to their WAS This propelled them the ement to fight back.
But when agaret Thatcher came to just quantauve leap took place among Womer were ate in the simply on walt and fight back on a basis. Women expression for demands in the leftone bour ray : the Debate of the ade in 1979 Tony Benn Audrey Wise urged m to join the They did. They the wonels turned them the most left wing the ment.
most left wing on on Ireland. The ' 60s t wing oute perce Far to the left of the •Party Young Socialference whose platiabout socialist have ramme mask accomBritish nialism. time took up te banner of accountmade it their The labour movement represented women blacks for decades.
become more acsate to these groups as as to the rank and file.
The Action Committee spearheaded this HONE 3O Г positIve action, winning the overwhelming suort or mie ravour rare women's conference for its demanus.
But it has been continually thwarted by the maioritv of men in the Parliamentary Labour Party and the trade union delegations to Labour The support that the Campaign Group of MPs, the left Labour Councillors and the NUM have given to wonel s demands broken through that tradwhert women's allegiance has to wilt lue ter. wing emerging inside the apon movemen tony.
The Women Against Pit Closures the movement. organisation of women in the peace movement, in the trade unions and the black sections has greatly deepened ts process to longer possible for the movemen militancy and the demands O1 wonel.
This radicalisation and politicisation of women is a mass phenomenon and flows directly experience of this governmovement. The Tories can solve the crisis of the Britch they decimate the living standards of the British working This is why. they wish to dismantle the welfare state privatise the Hallola ised industries. In doing so thev have to attack women because women are highly dependent on these services Thus Thatcher forces women to become political like she forces politics the miners and other Right now aim to deepen their attacks women. The Gillick victory against the scription of contraceptives under 16 year olds and the huge vote for Powell's bill to restrict experiment0 on emora posen principles that the moral majority will use to further attack rights, abortion rights and sexual rights in general.
with the Juneva reactionary 'gay plague' campaign being initiated by the press around AIDS, are aimed at turning the clock back from the gains of the '70s. Forty four MPs voted Powell's bill. If the cause of is really to be cause of women these MPs no role in represent. ing' the labour movement.
Now is therefore the consolidate the between and labour. It must be consolidated In action and againsi these reactionar attacks sexual and abortion rights.
members Party to ensure that their Women Against Pit Closures rally in London, August 1984 concerns are acleu on Women WAPC. from CND, from the trade unions, the black struggles and the abortion movement join the Labour Party to participate actively in the fight to build a left-wing inside it.
Women have shown hou they fight Thatcher. That must not be lost.
If women want a Party of Labour that consistently