John Corrie's Bill was defeated last November. Mainly through the support of the TUC, the Campaign Against Corrie mobilised such wide forces that the government was forced to back down and Corrie's Bill was thrown in the rubbish bin - where it belongs.
While Corrie's Bill has been defeated, however, the Tories' attack on women's abortion rights has not abated. On the contrary, the erosion of the 1967 Act continues as before.
CUT-BACK Under the Tories, according to latest statistics, the number of abortions in Britain has declined sharply, from 49.8% to just over 45%. This reduction is not because less women are having unwanted pregnancies or because less women wish their pregnancies terminated.
On the contrary, it is because cutday-care centres are being shelved, family planning clinics restricted and waiting lists growing longer and longer.
As the Brook Street Advisory Centre comments in their Annual Report, the increasing shortage of hospital beds is making it ever more difficult for women to be referred for abortions on the NHS.
BACK-STREETS Cut-backs in tacilities are compounded by cut-backs in staff. When doctors - or nurses to undertake recommended abortions, no alternative staffing can be found.
Perhaps it is these facts which explain why, when the number of abortions per year is increasing, the becomes a problem -backs in the NHS mean that promised forced, once again, back to the horrors of the back-streets?
FIGHT-BACK cuts.
- refuse TAL EXECUIIVE COUNCIL ABORTION Actr LEGAL OPPOSE THE CORRIE BILL percentage of them performed on the need, such as day-care abortion National Health is actually decreasing. centres... and therefore it calls for Many of these are, of course, soak. ed up by charitable institutions. But it is worth wondering - when finance continue campaigning to this end".
- how many of these women are actually being It is clear that if the National Abortion Campaign is to oppose this increasing restriction of abortion rights, it will need to win support within the general struggle - in the labour movement - against the The fact that, last year, the TUC was mobilised into supporting women's right to abortion shows that the potential certainly exists This was shown again, at this year's TUC, when a resolution deploring the effects of the government's cutbacks on women was passed:
"Congress notes the reduction in public spending is leading to a reduc- rights being planned by NAC for the tion in health services that women
KEEP IT
CORRE BA these provisions to be properly fund. ed and for the TUC movement to CAMPAIGN It is important to build on this growing understanding both to oppose the slow erosion of women's abortion rights and - even more significant - to begin the campaign for positive legislation which NAC is at present drawing up.
The aim of this campaign must be to commit the TUC and the Labour Party to include the right of women to abortion - and the funding of facilities necessary to exercise this right - in their election manifesto, and to stick to it when elected.
This will mean carrying the fight into the trade union and Labour Party branches in the period ahead and winning real support. A first step will be gaining support for the Trade Union conterence on abortion new year.
show that they are her children cuts supporters in the Labour Party is being called. The aim of the conference - already sponsored by a wide number of activists • is to organise activity in the party against the Tories' racist offensive.
Since coming to power, the Tories have dramatically stepped up their attacks on the rights of Black people in this country. The Anwar Ditta case, the 'fishing raids' at workplaces, the escalating number or deportations are all cases in point.
Most serious of all is their proposed Nationality Act. If passed, this will give the police the green light to increase their attacks on the Black community and cut across the ability of the labour morement to organise a united response to Thatcher.
BACK-DOWN Unfortunately, the Labour leaders - far from challenging the Tory racist offensive -have backed down before it. Over the years, they have been only too willing to implement racist laws, like the 1971 Immigration Act.
Figures such as Callaghan actually competed with the Tories in drawing up ever more draconian measures to keep Blacks out and turn the class citizens.
Tories intend introducing in the next session is modelled on a Labour government Green Paper that would have become law if they had remained in power.
FIGHT-BACK proposals. them. few who did get in into secondThe Nationality Bill that the It is to change this situation that the meeting on DecembBob Swart (Streatham CLP) er 17th has been called. Its aim is to bring together the widest number of Labour Party activists who can begin, now, a struggle to involve the party in a campaign against the Tory Early next year, CARL (the Campaign against Racist Laws) is planning a mass demonstration against the Nationality Act and other racist laws. Thousands of Black people will turn out to oppose the offensive directed against It is up to us to ensure that the Labour Party is fully be. hind that demonstration and organises massively on the day to halt the Tory racist attack in its tracks.
If you would like to attend the meeting - or find out more about CARL - please contact: CARL. c/o Lansbury Hse, 45 Camberwell Grove, SE 5.
Sponsors of the meeting include:
Alf Dubbs MP (Battersea) John Tilley MP (Lambeth Centralj Peter Hain (Putney)
Rudy Nurayan (Streatham) Janse Ansell (Finchley) Charlotte Atkins (Battersea) Liz Atkins (Battersea)
Paul Boeteng (Norwood) Terry Viney (Croydon) Mike Rodney (Finchley) George Hold (Peckham)
issues such as the 35-hour week among workers in car plants and petrochemical works, the pro-Labour swing was 8.8%.
CONSERVATIVE The only reason the pro-Labour vote wasn't higher, Direct Action argues. was because of the conservative policies of Labour leaders who offered no cleat answers to workers faced with the bosses orlensive Even though inflation is running at 11% and the jobless total nearing 500,000, the Labour leaders refused to back the popular call for a cost-of-living increase or the 35-hour Calling for a clear vote Labour, one of the main thrusts of the SWP was to campaign precisely around those demands which Labour should adopt. Under the slogan A Labour governmen with socialist policies, the SWP called on the Labour leaders to fight for a government 'that really defends the interests of working people' PROBLEM Even though Labour didn't win the election, Direct Action concludes, against Fraser means that the workers fight - wnich naa begal to develop momentum in 1980 - will be given a new impetus in