Scotland EE: SC available Collecti a Lane opp on sale 8-11 every 1.30-5. For more info contact Paul 17 Clyde View or John at 54 Eliot St, Wales BANGOR: Sat 10-12 town centre. 10.30-12, Also available 1-0-8 Book VEIORT: every Sat in town centre 1pm, Saturday England Londol Babour Club, leveland nights; o Sa reina p, Fri 4.30-3.40, Sat 104. Fo UANLEY: SC on sale every Sat mo Wedge 1pm. The Piazza. SC also available at Poderian Precine, and 10.:30. 12.00 Bookshops BIPMINGHAM: Olher Bookshop, 8Sa New Elve LFORD: South Essex Bookshop, 33:
OXFORD: EOA Books, ve 34 Cowley o hochapel, Liverpool o here, IVERPOOL What's Left ar ta per col. inch. Deadine: or T-SHIRTS: 'Solidarnosc' symbol, red n white, 'Jobs not Bombs nall, mediume and tale symbol red on yellow, black on red. Fourth International symbol, red on *hite, red on yellow, SC Events abour left?" with Clir. Carol Southwark.
:MG notices WALdO fration on Sat 1 August at July al Arge SI Com Revolution Youth notices 298501 Pocialist Challenge 2 July 1981 Whitechapel MANCHESTER SC sold 11-Ipm Sat Bank os pro vailable at Days of Hope bookshop.
SHEFFIELD:
STOCKPORT: SC sold every SaturWay. 483909 11-1 every London North Wembley BR Station.
Books, retoresce for Southern Afica, PO Box 50, London NI 2XP SUBVERT ,thur thur2 Julo 7.30pm. Community Health Co High Harlesden, NW10.
kers from LARC, CHC, Clinic SPARE BOOKS?
Bookshop, 328 Upper St, London NI 2XP.
Conference of Socialist Economists 1981 On the theme of Exploitation and Bradford University, July 17-19 Booking/details: CSE 16 St sipnonsas na, London s SW4 Revolt A CONTEMPORARY completely destroyed.' If such a description is accurate, that is reason enough to celebrate the anniversary of the Peasants' Revolt, which broke out 600 years ago this month.
Here indeed was a popular rebellion, aimed at overthrowing the established order, putting the rich and the powerful to flight, and dividing their property among the common people.
For the ruling barons the Church and the ancestors of Diana Spencer there was even more at stake tain Leon Trotsky was to talk of the need for revolution' which was to emphasise that to survive, a revolution cannot be confined to one country.
rect, the leaders revolt in England had some inkling of such ideas.
Nations 600-year-old equivalent of the peasants leaders: they might have come to their intents, they would Engrand, and e hereleter af England, and thereafter other nations would followed the same and taken foot and ensample from them.
Which suggests that Peasants' Revolt is worth amining. not lust because of its 600th anniversary, but because like all revolutions tul or otherwise lessons to be learnt hundreds of years after the events themSe ves Take the example social contract, and incomes policies. Such notions were not an invention of Harold Wilson.
One of the reasons for the Peasants' Revolt was an tempt by the ruling class of the 14th century to impose a wages •his first surtaced in the year 1351, three years after the Black reduction of eu workes doe o oe mand more for labour.
wage demands. the Statute Labourers was passed year 1351. This proclaimed:
'Against the malice of servants who were idle and unwilling to serve after the pestilence without taking wages it was recentiv ordainec by our lord the King, with the assent of the prelates and others of his council, that such servants, both men and women, should be obliged to serve in return for the salaries and wages which were customany during the 20th year of the present King 's reign.
freeze wages at the level had been 1347. remarkable how the lang chronicler wrote Peasants' Revolt: 'No longer restricting themselves to their original grievance and not so satisfied by minor crimes, they now planned much more radical and merciless evils: they determined not to give way until all the lords and magnates of the realm had been of the ruling class and its hack journalists have so little changed since then. workers parently, "idle' 'outrageous wages'.
of the in 1351 were, apand demanded - Just as we are tola today -The Statute of Labourers the Peasants 'It was unfair because no efof The ruling class today and Margaret Thatmissiles, and other The Hundred Years' War England and France King We have learnt that many and for that reached the coast and US; but the the town contempt To meet the cost of the war oi special taxes were each heavier In May, the people of the village of Fobbing at A few days later a large received even when DUILCIN opened the gates.
On this occasion villagers opened Church 'prospered target they could Meanwhile all the grea rustics, The rebellion also began to tune Contemporary drawing depicting peasants' leader Wat Tyl 10,000 and 50,000 - marched into the centre of the capital, their entrance assisted by supcity who Once inside the marchers prisons, ransacked bulldings, and beheaded some of the most hated lords and leaders. special was the Savoy, the residence of the hated John of Gaunt, where 'the company of incited to a wild fury, invaded the duke's hospice' The Savoy was burnt to the but the tens «ousarus wio ov now na taken over the streets of Lon don were not an undisciolinec mob with no aim but to loot destroy. A meeting addressed by one of the leaders of •LEC revolt, Dall. was described thus:
'At this time the commons had as their counsellor chaplin of evil disposition named Sir John Balle who advised them to get rid of the lords, archbishops, abbots and priors and their possessions would be divided among the laity For which advice he regarded as a prophet by the commoners.
When King Richard Il eventually agreec meet the leaders of the revolt he was presented series of
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aly 29 General suri back: 25h ar Son Da are prece
Oppression - Rethinking Socialist Strategy
Malice Le dematens the saatuie er
Geoff Bell marks the 600th anniversary of the Peasants'