TWO CEU MEMBERS DIE

On Wednesday, December 30th, two spidermen hurtled to their deaths as a girder toppled from the high-level Barton Bridge being erected over the Manchester Ship Canal. This brought the death roll on the job to six. Four men were killed in an accident last February. At an inquiry held after the February disaster the scaffolding construction was criticised.

The alarm and anger of Manchester spidermen at this new tragedy was expressed by Eddie Marsden, Chairman of the Manchester Branch of the Constructional Engineering Union. “This accident would not have happened if the men who knew the conditions of up anti-trade union and anti-worker sentiment splashed stories the job had not been sacked and had been allowed about the ‘fabulous’ earnings of £30 to £50 a week enjoyed by the workers. One paper even quipped that a special car to continue it.”’

park had had to be built to accommodate the workers’ cars.

In conversation with spidermen it became clear that they A spiderman with 15 years at the game said to me in discannot dissociate these new deaths from the sacking of 96 gust, “Some of these b— —s who print and lap up this stuff steel erectors two weeks previously. wouldn’t do what we have to do for £100 a week. They The main contractors, George Dew of Oldham, had just ter- treat us just as they treat the miners. When there’s a pit minated the sub-contract for steel erecting given to Samuel disaster everybody’s sorry, but when the miners ask for a Butler & Co., of Leeds, and had given it to a new firm, wage increase it’s another story.’ United Steel Structural Co., of Scunthorpe. Another steel erector added ‘What this proves is we’ve got The contractors’ explanation, widely blazoned across the to insist from the start of each job on proper safety regulapages of the Press, was that work on the contract had been tions.’ held up by ‘exorbitant pay demands’ and other disputes. The death roll in steel erection is the highest in industry ‘They are asking for the moon’ was the comment of one in proportion to the number employed. Bro. Patterson, boss’s spokesman. The Press with its usual concern to build General Secretary of the C.E.U., has stated that last year they

186 Clapham High Street, London, S.W.4 Telephone Macaulay 7029 SATURDAY, JANUARY 9, 1960 However, the steel bosses are well-known for using wage increases as the excuse for boosting steel prices. Of course, steel is such a basic commodity that an inflationary spiral is almost inevitable. This will be helped along by a-round of wage demands encouraged by the steelmen’s victory. We hear a lot nowadays about the State’s ability to regulate the economy. But will the