The conference was moved when Pat Wall declared: "No power on earth can stop the organized labor movement!" He concluded by calling for Labour to win the workers to a program of taking power by taking over the 350 monopolies which controlled 85 per cent of the economy.

Ray Apps seconded the resolution. He was to become almost a permanent fixture at Labour Party conferences, so much so that when the purge of Militant took place in the 1980s, The Times happily concluded that the conference had become an "Apps-free zone".

Ray pointed to the 'excellent reforms' in Labour's program but observed that "they cannot be carried out". At this conference, Patrick Craven, a well-known Militant supporter, received 51,000 votes in the election for the NEC, which reflected the support of between 45 to 50 local parties.

The week before the conference Militant recorded the significant growth in its support: "From a four-page monthly to an eight-page weekly in 13 months." Commenting on the progress which had been made it stated:

The first eight-page Militant is out! This is the greatest achievement of our paper in its eight-years' life. In just 13 months it has been transformed from a monthly four-page paper, with excellent articles, but poorly produced and drab looking, to a magnificently produced weekly eight-page paper. Politically we believe that Militant has always carried the best reports and clearest analysis of events in the labor movement and the world. The great handicap has been space. (2)

The Times had "looked hopefully towards 1972 as an improvement over the previous year". They commented that 1971 "was not a good year for Conservatives".

1972 was even worse. The miners had shattered the government's eight per cent wage norm, winning an increase of 22 per cent. In the miners' strike 65,000 miners out of 280,000 were involved in pickets. In answer to this, Tory Home Secretary Carr promised to set up "mobile squads" of police to counter the actions of the workers. The Heath government did not quite manage to do this but Thatcher, who followed him, learnt the lessons of the 1972 and 1974 miners' strikes and prepared the police in a paramilitary fashion to crush the miners next time they went on strike.

Indicating the power of the labor movement, even Vic Feather, the general secretary of the TUC in 1972, had declared: "No-one can do anything to the unions that the unions don't want done."

Militant pointed out that

the relationship of forces between the capitalist class and the working class is overwhelmingly favorable to the latter. But they are bound and gagged by their own leadership. (3)

Even after these tumultuous events, the general council of the TUC were still engaged in talks with the government!

Yorkshire was one of the areas where racism was on the rise. Militant, dealing with the conditions in Bradford, stated:

It is obvious that in these circumstances, pious appeals to brotherhood and racial harmony from the well-heeled do-gooders are worse than useless... It is not Race Relations Boards that are required, but positive action by the labor movement. (5)

Calling for workers to mobilize against the danger of racism in the area, Militant declared:

Many Labour leaders think if they ignore the issue it will go away. Other local leaders pander to racial prejudice thinking that will prevent 'racial extremists' from gaining support. No greater or more fatal mistake can be made. The movement must be mobilized now, locally and nationally. It must be geared to an anti-Tory, anti-capitalist campaign. (6)

As a result of the pressure of Militant supporters within the labor movement, and particularly the Labour Party Young Socialists, the national executive of the Labour Party sanctioned a national demonstration in Bradford, which took place in May 1974. This was the first national mobilization of any section of the official labor movement against racism.

At the Skegness conference, there was tremendous enthusiasm for the ideas of Marxism underlined by the biggest ever Militant public meeting held at an LPYS conference up to then. All the fringe meetings were well attended, as was the week-long rally which followed the conference. Militant, however, still only had 397 organized supporters by March 1973 despite its growing influence. By July of the same year it had grown to 464.

It was not just at conferences of their own organization that the weight of the LPYS was felt. The representative of the LPYS on the NEC of the Labour Party, Peter Doyle, was a key member of the Left who succeeded in getting the NEC to adopt a program for the public ownership of 25 of Britain's top companies. The day after the NEC, Harold Wilson threatened that the shadow cabinet would veto its inclusion in the next election manifesto.

Militant commented:

Is national conference the supreme policy-making body of the Labour Party, or is it just a rally to cheer the politicians at the top? The NEC should be inundated with resolutions of support to strengthen its hand in defending party democracy.

At the same time we must ask why the NEC has not insisted on the full implementation of the Shipley resolution? Which 25 companies, and why only them? Is it the intention to nationalize their assets or as originally proposed only for a state holding company to buy a 51 per cent share in them... If public ownership is the best system, then it applies to the entire economy. We do not want to take over every barbers' or fish and chip shop, but the giant monopolies that dominate the economy, numbering some 250-300. (8)

Interestingly, Militant quoted in the same issue the comments of Denis Healey:

We are all agreed with the need for a massive extension of public ownership... establishing comprehensive planning control over the hundred or so largest companies in Britain... and to extend public ownership in the profitable manufacturing industries. (9)

Roy Hattersley, the leading right winger, also "argued in favor of nationalizing North Sea gas and oil, development land and rented property."

This decision to propose the nationalization of the 25 companies was carried with the decisive vote of Peter Doyle, LPYS representative on the NEC. This indicated the crucial role which the LPYS, and through them the Marxists, played in shaping the policy and the direction of the labor movement at this stage (and later, as Militant supporters, Nick Bradley, Tony Saunois, Laurence Coates, Steve Morgan, Frances Curran, Linda Douglas and Hannah Sell did over the next 15 years).

1973 seemed to demonstrate an almost unstoppable movement towards the Left within the labor movement.

In June of that year, Militant again reported on the progress of the Clay Cross struggle. John Dunn, a Clay Cross LPYS member and a future Clay Cross councilor, reported:

Had other authorities built houses at the same rate as Clay Cross, we would have had the figure of one and a half million new houses being built every year. The complete municipalization of all rented property is rapidly seeing the end of all landlords capitalizing on second-rate property... No child in Clay Cross has missed his or her free school milk since 'milk-snatcher Thatcher' tried to take it away. (10)

Meanwhile, the Clay Cross councilors were being dragged before the law courts for refusing to implement the Housing Finance Act. The effective leader of the struggle, councilor David Skinner, appeared before the High Court on Monday, July 9, when judgment was reserved for two weeks. Writing in Militant, he declared:

Our opposition was based on being honest with ourselves and the people who put us there and because, even in local government, it is possible to assist in changing society. To hear most councilors talk one would imagine they are incapable of organizing resistance to the impositions of the central government. If all the Labour councils followed the example of Clay Cross it would be impossible to carry out the Housing Finance Act.

He went on:

By not implementing the Act we have saved the working-class ratepayers £70,000. We do not look after only the tenants but the council employees as well. The unions claimed a one-third increase in wages which we have granted. (11)

Later they were surcharged and banned from office.

Amongst leftward moving workers, however, there was a keen interest in workers' control. There was confusion over the demands for workers' control and management which was reinforced by some on the left. Militant explained:

Both demands apply to different stages of the class struggle. Workers' control is only possible on a mass scale in the period which immediately precedes or just after the socialist revolution... Workers' control means that the workers exercise control over the capitalists, checking the outgoings and ingoings, having access to all the books and accounts of the capitalists... Workers' management, on the other hand, comes from above and is exercised by the workers' state, that is, the centralized soviets representing the workers as a whole. (12)

Some right-wing Labour leaders at the time sought to discredit the ideas of workers' control and management by denouncing them as 'syndicalism'. Militant argued that:

The ideas of the syndicalists, that after the socialist revolution each industry will be managed and controlled by the workers in that industry, is completely utopian. Its implementation would lead to the complete breakdown of the economy and society, with one industry pitted against another. It would be impossible to implement a national plan, without which industry, science and technique could not develop. (13)

Benn received loud applause at the conference for the statement: "If we do not control or own them (the monopolies), they will control and own us." This was a direct reflection of the pressure of the Marxists, gathered around the Militant, on the leading lefts within the labor movement. Yet Benn and the other lefts did not draw all the conclusions from their own statements. Nevertheless, an indication of the mood of the conference was shown in the left rhetoric of those to the right of Benn, the Tribunite left.

For once, this was a truthful account of what had transpired at the conference and what was also taking place in constituency parties and trade union branches.

A month after the conference, however, Labour suffered a defeat in the Glasgow Govan by-election and also recorded low votes in a number of other seats. The ruling class were exultant and blamed Labour's program for these setbacks. In reality, the opposite was the case. The program adopted by the conference was never used to organize a bold campaign which clearly set Labour apart from all other parties. This was particularly evident in Govan where at least the Scottish National Party, as Militant reported "grasped that there was a basis for a radical sounding campaign." The SNP demanded the setting up of a Scottish Parliament with control over industry. Their slogan "Poor British or Rich Scots", clearly related to the discovery and potential revenue from North Sea oil.

Militant declared:

A victory for the miners will be a body blow to the Tories and a triumph for the whole working class. But to win this bitter fight, the whole movement must be mobilized and the campaign extended onto a political plane for the defeat of the Tory government. (17)

The government in effect declared a lock-out for two days every week against the British working class. As 1974 began Militant commented:

Many bosses had jumped the gun, laying off 554,000 workers by last weekend. One to two million totally unemployed is predicted very soon, as the bosses use the emergency as an excuse for sackings; 100,000 in steel alone has been forecast. 15 million workers will be affected with the drastic cut in wages that implies. (18)

Militant demanded: (1) Recall of the TUC conference; (2) Work or full pay; and (3) A one-day general strike. The intimidatory methods of the government did not have the desired effect in splitting the rest of the working class away from the miners. The Evening Standard reported on the views of workers forced out of their jobs in the queue on a London employment exchange: "To a man - and woman - they were behind the miners." (19)

Nevertheless, the Heath government persisted with its trial of strength, even resorting to openly publicizing the training of the army and the police in riot control techniques. The army displayed its prowess at Heathrow Airport. Tanks and other military hardware, allegedly for use in 'anti-terrorist' and 'anti-subversive' situations, were deployed. This prompted Scottish miners' leader, Mick McGahey to say that if soldiers were asked to break a miners' strike then

I will appeal for them to assist and aid the miners. Troops are not all anti-working class... Many of them are miners' sons - sons of the working class. (20)

This provoked the fury of the ruling class. The London Evening Standard carried the comments of the commanding officer of a British infantry battalion:

Give me the chance to go and pick up Mr. Michael McGahey and if it turns out to be my last assignment in the army I should die happy. The kind of remarks he made about appealing to the troops represents a very sinister trend - not because he made them, but because we are too weak-willed a society nowadays to clap him straight inside for incitement to mutiny.

However, The Evening Standard, much more cautiously, summed up the thinking of a section of the ruling class:

How far could the government rely on the army to do whatever was asked of it in a major industrial emergency? If McGahey and his supporters appealed to British soldiers as fellow workers, would there ever be a chance that they could cause a military unit to break ranks?

One Glasgow soldier declared:

I wouldn't move coal. It's not my job; if the miners want to strike for more money, good luck to them. (21)

The whole furor around this issue indicated the heightened class tensions which existed in Britain at this stage. Militant pointed out:

Such champions of democracy as the Tories depict themselves today would not think twice at abandoning their democratic veil if they felt it necessary. It would be a fatal mistake to bow down to the army. (22)

Another example of the attempt at intimidation of workers was the arrest, trial and subsequent jailing of two building workers, the Shrewsbury Two; Ricky Tomlinson (who later earned fame by appearing in Brookside, and other TV programs and films) and Des Warren, (Des was sentenced to three years and released after 30 months; Ricky got two years and was released after 18 months).

This intervention was decisive in holding the seat for Labour. Militant supporters played a crucial role in ensuring a Labour victory. The paper's opponents also suggested that it was decisive in a number of seats. In view of later charges of "sectarianism" against us, it is important to note that despite the fact that there was no parliamentary candidate clearly supporting Militant or Marxism, we nevertheless threw our full weight into ensuring a Labour victory.

Yet Militant, and particularly the Labour Party Young Socialists, earned nothing but praise, not just from those lefts like Tony Benn who publicly recognized their role, but also from those on the right like Paul Rose, MP for Blackley in Manchester.

At that time, Militant clearly warned that a new Labour government which remained within the framework of capitalism could be frustrated by the serious crisis of British capitalism.