Report to the Sixth Comintern Congress on the economic and political situation in Australia in as well as the activity of its 550 or so members of the Communist Party.
‘Report of the Communist Party of Australia’ from The Communist International Between the Fifth and the Sixth Congresses, 1924-28.
THE ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL SITUATION.
THE development of Australia is proceeding along the lines of growing independence from British economy. This development is furthered and accelerated by two factors: the possibility of a monopolist exploitation of the natural resources of an entire continent with a numerically small population, and the possibility of exploitation of the constant influx of immigrants from highly developed countries, especially from Great Britain. Thus, changes have occurred during the last few years in the economic structure of Australia in favour of industry. Whereas formerly chiefly textile goods were imported, now the chief import goods are metallurgical products and machinery. Although Australia is still an agrarian country, its agrarian capitalism is on a higher stage of development from the point of view of productive forces and is bound up with a considerable industrial development. Whereas manufactured goods constitute about 5 per cent. of the exports, the value of the agricultural exports constitutes about one-third of the total. Side by side with the development of the export of agricultural produce there is also a development in the export of textile, leather and metallurgical products.
The number of industrial workers has increased since 1917 from 267,000 to 450,000 at the present time. The output of iron has increased from 40,000 tons in 1913 to 457,000 in 1926. The output of steel has increased from 181,000 tons in 1919 to 360,000 In 1926.
The rapid growth of Australian capitalism has not been able to make headway without foreign credits and loans, particularly from Great Britain. But whereas before the war Australia was in this matter entirely a British colony, at the present day it is escaping from this dependence. Its relations with British imperialism are being increasingly affected by the interests of the Australian bourgeoisie.
The inclination of the Australian states to apply to New York for loans that could not be obtained in London is characteristic of the striving for autonomy on the part of this colony. United States capital has already penetrated into Australia during the last ten years, but it has as yet been unable to get control of the key industries. Its activity has been chiefly limited to the new industries, as, for instance, the radio industry, cinema, etc. Most of the purely American enterprises are branches of the United States stock companies. On the other hand, the share of the U.S.A. in Australian imports is increasing by leaps and bounds, rising from £18.8 millions in 1921-22 to £37.2 millions in 1925-26, or an increase of from 18.2 per cent. of the imports to 24.5 per cent. at a time when the British share has fallen over the same period from 51 per cent. to 43.4 per cent.
Unemployment is relatively high, reaching the peak of 100,000 in January, 1928) and is aggravated by state-aided mass immigration.
There are two bourgeois parties in Australia, the Nationalist Party, representing the banking and importing interests, and the big Capitalists, and generally favourable to British imperialist policy, and the Country Party, which represents the farmers and general agrarian interests.
The two parties have maintained a coalition Federal government under Bruce since the end of 1926. This policy of coalition obtains also in the states with the exception of Victoria.
The Commonwealth government (bourgeois coalition) is in close co-operation with the British Imperial government, and is bitterly anti-Trade Union. Its first act was the passing of a law (“Crimes Act”) which makes the Communist Party virtually illegal. This law has not yet been fully utilised. In 1927 a bill was introduced into Parliament whose terms will cripple the power of the trade unions as militant organisations and bind them to compulsory state arbitration in industrial disputes. This bill is not yet law and is being strongly opposed by the organised working class.
The Australian Labour Party is a federal organisation composed of affiliated trade unions, and with an individual membership organised on an electoral basis, under an extremely reactionary and bureaucratic leadership. The various state Labour Party organisations have a large measure of autonomy. Labour Governments with an orthodox bourgeois policy exists in four out of six states. In Queensland, a Labour Government has been in office continuously for a period of thirteen years and has come into conflict with the organised workers with increasing frequency. As a result of its threat last year to lock out the railway employees who refused to handle scab sugar, together with its open attack on the striking building trade workers early in 1927, the Queensland Labour Government has aroused bitter and widespread antagonism among the workers.
The policy of the Australian Labour Party is one of class collaboration, nationalism, “White Australia”, and high tariffs on imports. It extends partial support to British imperialism. Strong internal dissensions occur frequently, and in every state the dominant bureaucracy of the Australian Workers’ Union is being challenged by other unions and Left and pseudo-Left elements combined. In New South Wales, in 1927, the Labour Party split, and new rules were set up giving more control to the Trade Unions instead of the Electoral Leagues and the monopolist A.W.U.
The Australian T.U. movement, whose membership is now approximately 900,000, is fairly militant, but has a long tradition of arbitration in State Courts (not compulsory) in industrial disputes. This arbitration outlook has created a somewhat “legalist” ideology and provided the basis for a thoroughly reactionary and well-entrenched bureaucracy.
In May, 1927, the Australian Trade Unions established the Australian Council of Trade Unions, as a co-ordinating body. The largest union in Australia, however, the Australian Workers’ Union, with 150,000 members, refuses to participate. Its leadership is the most unscrupulous and reactionary of all, and there appears to be a possibility that they will attempt to create a separate centralised Trade Union organisation. Although weak organisationally, and dominated by Right wing elements, the Australian Union of Trade Unions has affiliated to the Pan Pacific Conference. Five Trades Councils and a number of individual unions are affiliated to the Australian Council of Trade Unions, but in some cases the affiliation is purely nominal. The Trades Councils play an important role in the Australian Labour movement, centralising the Trade Union Movement in the various states. The total number is 26, but many unions remain unaffiliated.
There were four significant industrial disputes during 1927. In Queensland the building workers struck for a 40-hour week and the railway porters were locked out for refusing to handle scab sugar. In both cases the Labour government used all its forces against the unions and aroused extremely bitter resentment among the working class. The engineers engaged in a struggle against piece-work and speeding up, in which they were successful, and the waterside workers refused to work overtime as a protest against Arbitration Court delays, and were locked out by the employers as a result. This struggle was very badly led, and ended in a compromise which was virtually a defeat. These disputes may be said to indicate a certain trend to the Left among sections of the workers, but the feeling is vague as yet. The Party has latterly undertaken, with the assistance of the Communist International, the building-up of an All-Australian Left wing movement in the Trade Unions around a definite programme of class demands and the policy of the Red International of Labour Unions. The possibilities in this direction are extremely promising. Similar steps have been taken within the Labour Party as a means of rallying Left elements against the reformist policy and leadership of that body.
COMMUNIST PARTY.
The Communist Party was formed in November, 1920, and passed through many difficulties in the first year or two, arising out of lack of unity. Since 1922, however, the Party has been unified. In 1925 the membership in Australia was 280, It is now about 550. Numerous unsatisfactory members left or were expelled in 1925-26, including Garden and Barrachi, and the Party began to improve. Since then some progress has been made. The Party organ “Workers’ Weekly” has a circulation of 4,500. The Party is weak organisationally and the theoretical level of the membership is low; although in some influences its influence is fairly strong in the Trade Unions, general contact in the unions has been poor. There has also been neglect with regard to factory and workshop organisation.
The biggest group is in Sydney (110 members). It has no local contacts, which puts the Party in a position of being isolated in a city with a population of over one million.
Ten groups were formed in Queensland in 1927, with a total membership of 200 members. If organisers are placed in the field this Queensland membership can be doubled, as the circumstances are particularly favourable for the growth of the Communist Party because of the numerous attacks on the workers by the Labour Government. A group of 32 members in Melbourne and a very active group of 14 members in Lithgow, a mining centre in New South Wales, completes the number of groups in Australia. The Party has no contact apart from the official organ and a few members at large.
In the Trade Unions the Party has registered some minor successes in fraction work. This activity is improving but still requires much attention. The Trades Councils of N.S.W. and Townsville are the only councils with an organised Communist fraction. Org. Department and Agitprop work has hitherto been lacking in serious efforts to build these up. Following the last Party Congress, however, much improvement is expected in this direction. Also the preliminary work in connection with factory nuclei is being tackled, which indicates progress in the task of making contact with the factory workers.
The crisis and factional fight in the Labour Party during 1927 demonstrated the need for an organised Left wing under the leadership of the Party, and with a clear-cut policy in regard to the question of the fight against the leadership and the class peace programme of the Labour Party. This question has been taken up by the Party and steps taken to rally the Left wing in the trade unions and A.L.P. against the reformist policy and leadership.
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