Main content on side 1 does not start until about 1 minute 20 seconds. Runs too fast in latter part of side 2.
Subjects of 1.34 include (transcript page numbers given in brackets): McShane’s campaign in the ‘Daily Worker’ on inadequate air-raid shelters in Glasgow at the start of Second World War (2-3); strict enforcement of Communist Party line during the war (8-9); Trotskyists’ support for strikes in Scotland in opposition to Communist Party line (10-12); popularity of Communist Party support for the war in order to help the Soviet Union (12-14); increase in Communist Party membership (14-17); enthusiasm in the party for economic planning after the war (17-18); disagreement within the party over Tito (18-19); opposition around 1952 by McShane and others in Glasgow to party policy of advocating a peace pact between the Soviet Union, United States, China, France and Britain to the exclusion of other activities, which was construed as an attack on the leadership (19-24).
Subjects of 1.35 include (transcript page numbers given in brackets): events leading up to McShane’s resignation from the Communist Party in July 1953 because of differences with the leadership (1-8); formation in 1953 by McShane, Gerry Healy, Eric Heffer and others of a short-lived federation of Marxist groups (10-11); getting a job in Harland and Wolff shipyard at the age of sixty-two (13-14); working for Glasgow Trades Council (15-17); speech by McShane at the Scottish TUC around 1962 on the future of shipbuilding (17-18); his desire to resume campaigning with working people (19-20); trades council’s failure in recent times to promote solidarity with European socialists (21-22); need to expose the lack of socialist vision of the Communist Party bureaucracy and challenge its wish to control campaigns such as that against the Industrial Relations Act (23-25); McShane’s scepticism about Upper Clyde Shipbuilders (25-26); shut-down of Communist Party’s industrial organisation after Second World War and McShane’s opposition to it (26-27).
Brand: Philips C90.