BUILT THE UNION, SOLD ‘BUILDERS’ VOICE’
1959The NewsletterEdward Knight Read the scan at ETOL (PDF) →Read from the scan by machine and not corrected: headlines and words can be misread, and a caption or advert can run into the text. For anything you quote, read the scan.
SACKING of George Moffatt from the Clyde Tunnel site, Linthouse, Glasgow, is a clear case of victimization.
Bro. Moffatt, the Transport and General Workers’ Union shop steward, had only been on the job for three months. (Before then he was convener of shop stewards at the Goodyear tire factory, but had been victimized for his trade union activities.)
the action of the riveters. This of course means that they will receive no unemployment benefit.
The employers’ federation has announced its intention to support its member firms to the hilt. It warns that any concession to the riveters will open the way to an all-round claim on the part of the shipbuilding workers.
It threatens action unless the riveters accept employment at the yards where there is trouble.
This is interpreted as the threat of a total lock-out of all riveters on the river. That of course means a threat to close down the whole of the industry.
The employers’ determination to break the riveters and to maintain their policy of driving down the conditions of the shipbuilding workers is a challenge that they cannot be allowed to get away with.
The district committee of the Boilermakers’ Society has endorsed the riveters’ demands, but that is not enough. Now is the time to cut across all the sectional barriers among the shipyard workers.
A real campaign should be conducted throughout the yards explaining that the riveters’ demands for guaranteed employment and a wage increase are in line with the needs of every worker, and that the employers’ threats are aimed at every worker on the Clyde.
In this way a campaign uniting every section of the industry would be under way. The possibilities of such united action are considerable.