One year of the print strike by the strikers than the last "final offer" in May 1986. But Murdoch followed this up with proposals for redundancy settlements to individual strikers, going outside the union machinery. This had a limited success, undoubtedly due to economic hardship among the strikers, which has also led some of them to take other
IT IS NOW ONE YEAR since the 5,500 News International printworkers voted for strike action against Rupert Murdoch's attempts to destroy union organization. Following the vote, Murdoch sacked all the strikers. (See box.)
On January 24, the anniversary of the strike, 25,000 printworkers and their supporters held a mass picket of the Wapping plant where
Murdoch moved his four newspapers, produced by scab workers.
Police moved in against the demonstrators, injuring over 100 and making 67 arrests.
The strikers have now been out for as long as the miners in their historic 1984-85 strike, and they are continuing to fight in spite of seemingly overwhelming odds.
HILARY ELEANOR
Rupert Murdoch's high-technology plant alongside the Thames is justifi-
"Fortress Wapping."
The scabs who work inside have be bussed in from mainline railway stations, and when they have crossed the picket lines outside they wisely stay inside for the rest of the day,
"protected" from the striking printworkers outside by police, razor wire, steel fencing, arc lights and monitor
Nevertheless, the journalists technical staff are rewarded for their surroundings highest wages in the newspaper indust-
The production staff were recruited by Murdoch to work at Wapping with the help of the right-wing the EEPTU, even before the strike had begun.
(1) The whole Wapping operation was planned by
Murdoch to break the power of the unions in Fleet Street (the traditional centre of the newspaper publishing industry).
To some extent he has succeeded, but only with the help of the of the trade-union realism" is latest vogue of the right wing, placing the "moderate" trade uniorism of the past. It is the bureaucrats' answer to Margaret Thatcher and her government's onslaught on the labour movement in the form of mass unemployment, attacks on welfare and living standards and anti-trade
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There is nothing "new" about "new class collaboration, putting the national (i.e. ruling class's) interest first and capitulation to the bosses.
Murdoch's attacks on the printand the sorry failure of the trade-union leaderships to confront them, have led other press barons to follow his lead. Over 10,000 jobs were lost in Fleet Street in 1986. In the latest assault, management at the Daily Telegraph have imposed a no. strike deal on wages, jobs and conditions. Frightened of losing members if they led a fightback, the union leaderships agreed, and the company to sack 1,200 Slaughter of jobs and trade-union rights
In the midst of the carnage of jobs and trade-union rights, the striking News International printworkers have provided a beacon of courage and determination. But they have been fighting against all the odds, and have had to take on not just Murdoch and his supporters in the Tory Party, but their own union leaders. (2)
Murdoch made final" ultimatum to the strikers last
But none of this is surprising given the length of the dispute, and the fact that barely 2,000 4,500 strikers are getting strike pay, which has now been cut from £12 to
The main print union involved, SOGAT, balloted its members in early January this year for a 58 pence a week levy. This would have brought in over £2 million pounds a week, but it was narrowly lost, with only 56 per cent of the 200,000 members voting.
This result is an indictment of the national SOGAT leadership, in par ticular because the national union desperately needs funds, having spent over £2.5 million in the course of the dispute on court cases and compensation - a necessary punishment meted out to any trade union these days that dares to back strike action, however halfheartedly. This attempt to bankrupt the unions is just one of the results of the Tories' trade-union laws. (3)
The lack of confidence of SOGAT members in their union leaders to lead the strike to victory is a consequence of twelve months of backtracking, and even outright sabotage of the strike, by national secretary Brenda Dean and her team.
one of the dispute, even before the strike had begun, Dean was trying desperately to stitch up a deal with Murdoch. And ever since, the union leaders have resorted to secret ballots, opposing mass action and democratic control of the strike by the strikers. They have had to be pushed every inch of the way.
Leaderships of the other unions involved in the dispute have done little better. These include another print union, the NGA, the journalists?
and electricians in the AEU. Years of disunity in the industry has
1. See 'International Viewpoin? No. 97, April 21, 1986, for background articles on the dispute.
2. See "Crucial stage for print strike" No. 106, October 13, Eleanor and Patrick Field, 'IV'
Steve Roberts TV No. 47, February 27, 1984. unions" International Viewpoint 9 February 1987
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BRITAIN
International Viewpoint 9 February 1987 members of one union crossing another's picket line, with the unions
"poaching"
members from one as traditional demarcation another
PRINTSTRIKE CHRONOLOGY lines are blown apart by the introduction of new technology.
At the level of the national trade-
1985
"new union federation, the TUC,
September: News International (NI) boss Rupert Murdoch recruits scab labour in realism"
leaving has predominated,
Southampton and concludes a deal with the right-wing electricians' union, the the strikers isolated. But at September's TUC conference, delegates over-
December:NI proposes draft work agreement, allegedly on a new London evening turned the General Council's report newspaper. This includes no negotiating rights for union branches. Murdoch for their refusal to stop EEPTU announces on December 29 that Wapping is in fact to be used to print NI's existing scabs from working at Wapping.
titles, The Times, Sunday Times, News of the World and the Sun.
January: Sections of the Sunday Times printed at Wapping. Strike begins on
January 24 officially supported by print unions SOGAT and the NGA, the NUJ
Union's secret deals with
(journalists) and the AEU (electricians). Soon followed by sacking of the 5,500 NI
Murdoch
February: First mass pickets begin. Law courts seize SOGAT's funds for organizing boycotts of NI newspapers and "secondary action".
March: 6,000-strong women's demonstration at Wapping on International
Revelations since then have proved
Women's Day. Redundancies announced at the Daily Express and Manchester all that the EEPTU's
Evening News. Robert Maxwell, another press baron, announces that he will follow leaders were up to their necks in secret
April: 30,000 attend national demonstration in support of strikers on April 6. During deals with Murdoch as early as 1984 negotiations, Murdoch offers the unions a settlement including the old Grays Inn to recruit his scab workforce. Anger plant as premises for a labour movement newspaper! SOGAT leadership say they at the TUC's refusal to deal with the
EEPTU, and its general inactivity
May: 10,000-strong mass picket on May 3, led by SOGAT members who have in support of the strike, has led to marched from Scotland. It is viciously attacked by the police, with demands in the labour movement for a demonstrators injured. Strikers produce the first issue of their own newspaper, The recall TUC conference.
Wapping Post. Mass meeting on May 19 overwhelmingly rejects Murdoch's offer, but SOGAT leader Brenda Dean announces that a secret ballot will be held.
The role of the national Labour
June: Ballot result announced on June 12. Strikers vote to reject the offer. SOGAT
Party headed up by Neil Kinnock conference votes to back the strikers, and the union executive takes control of the has been similar to the one it played during the 1984-85 miners' strike - dispute. Mass meetings of strikers vote to step up the struggle and demand a keeping its head down in fear of an
August: The Observer newspaper announces the transfer of production to sites anti-union, anti-Labour backlash. But
September: The national trade-union federation, the TUC, votes to overturn the the January 24 demon-
General Council's proposal not to take action against the EEPTU, whose members stration led even the usually quiesare still crossing picket lines to work in Wapping. Murdoch makes a new "final cent opposition to call for a public offer" to the strikers, which is rejected at a mass meeting on September 25. Daily
Telegraph newspaper workers are offered a Murdoch-style agreement including inquiry into the police attack.
binding arbitration, job cuts, wage reductions and a no-strike clause.
Labour Party leaders, however, will
October: Strikers also reject Murdoch's "final offer" in a ballot by a larger majority not stick their necks out when at any than last time. TUC General Council fails to take action against the EEPTU.
time now Thatcher could go to the
November: TUC General Council votes by 23 votes to 21 not to reopen the file on the country and call an early general election. It is hardly surprising that the
December: A recently-elected member of the SOGAT executive, Mike Hicks, is jailed for 12 months after being arrested outside Wapping. Inter-union meeting
Tories are doing well at the moment calls national demonstration for January 24, and also for a recall TUC congress.
in the opinion polls, with an opposi-
Mass picketing continues, with the biggest-ever Saturday night turn-out since the tion that tries desperately to appeal to the status quo, to moderation and
"law and order": to out-Tory the to
Why should people vote for
Tories.
a pale imitation when they can have the real thing?
In spite of all these obstacles and problems, the printworkers are still fighting and they have wide support at the base of the labour movement, and from some left Labour Members of
Parliament and trade-union leaders.
Following the examples of organiduring the miners' zation strike, printworkers' support committees have been organized all over the country to build support and collect noney for the strikers. Many local
Labour
Party and trade-union branches have organized speaking tours for the strikers, and done a great deal of work in broadening support, looth moral and material.
Murdoch's example. national levy for strike pay. outside of London. summer.
important development last - Women Against Murdoch. This tives and friends of the printworkers, and it has been a key factor in keeping the momentum of the strike going and organizing support, particularly among women, in London. WAM has also developed links with Women Against Pit Closures, which has continued to organize locally and nationsince the end of the miners' estimated that something in the region of 2,000 people have been arrested at the Wapping pickets. In December, a leader of the strikers and member of the SOGAT's national executive, Mike Hicks, was jailed for
12 months. This draconian sentence provoked an escalation in support for the strikers, witnessed by the massive turnout for the anniversary demonstration. Many other picketers are facing serious charges and threatened with prison sentences.
But the mass pickets and boycotts of Murdoch's newspaper alone cannot win this dispute. What the strikers desperately need is real support from the rest of the trade-union and labour movement, most crucially in the form of solidarity strike action from their comrades in the newspaper industry.
Without a boost like that, and a victorious end to this hard-fought battle, the British labour movement will have little to look forward to in 1987.
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