[120 strikers and suppporters picketed the Adwest Engineering…]
Socialist Press1980 1980-08-13Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 11 →
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120 strikers and suppporters picketed the Adwest Engineering factory in Reading last Monday.
• It was the third mass picket called by the strike committee in support of the 58 strikers who were sacked after striking in support of one victimised worker during a pay dispute.
The picket was a partial success in that it focussed more attention on the strike and because it partially reestablished the democratic right to picket.
At previous mass pickets the right to picket had been totally denied by the police.
The TGWU convenor Danny Broderick was arrested when he attempted, ' single handed, to picket the gate.
At the previous mass picket in June 26 pickets were arrested when the attempted to defy the police and exercise the right to picket.
On Monday things were very different. Negotiations with the police two days before had UNION DUES resulted in a compromise-that ten strikers would be atlowed. to picket and lobby the scabs going into the plant.
This resulted. in some vigorous picketing-but failed to stop any of the scabs going in.
No official support In a press conference afterwards Danny Broderick placed the main blame for their failure to shift the position of Adwest management squarely at the door of the TGWU, who after nearly 14 weeks of the strike still refuse to make it official.
He showed copies of the letter from the TGWU Reading District Secretary supporting the strike a few days after it started and calling on all TGWU members not to cross the picket line.
He explained how the inght shift was called out on strike by the District Secretary of the union and now, are denied official support.
He told how the TGWU leadership had then used the bad book keeping of the branch secretary to avoid giving official The strike committee, he said, had met Larry Smith, an Executive officer of the union, last week.
Smith had given them a "sympathetic hearing" and raised the matter at Thursday's F&GP and the General Executive Council. They decided to instruct the Region 2 F&GP to meet the strike committee and sort out the problem of the books.
The strikers naturally thought this was a step in the right direction, and contacted the Region 2 office to find out when the meeting was to take place.
They phoned John Ashman, the Regional Secretary and were told that it would not take place for at least a month-after they had been 14 weeks on strike!
A similar story was told by Martin Kaufman a sacked THANK YOU GENTLEMEN - THIS BRITISH LEYLAND PLAN IS A GREAT STEP FORWARD!
HE TOOK IT, THE SUCKER!
... AND OF COURSE WE, I MEAN YOU WILL HAVE TO ACCEPT A CUT IN WAGES... SPEED-UP!
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