Id like to start by telling you about my experience in last year's building strike, which began for me on 26 June.
We were told by the trade union leaders that our site had been selected Lo start a national strike in the North Wales area. We were told by a UCATT official that this was an official strike and he didn't want us to just go home, he wanted us to get out and picket and spread the word that this was an official strike for the future of an industry which gave all the profits to a few and could not pay a decent wage for the people who worked in it.
It s only recently in our area that a lot of people have become trade unionists. If I had gone to the men on my site and started talking they were a brand of sheep. These people were not militant people. They were told to go out on strike and they did.
We found other people who were behind the workers" struggle and we united to carry our struggle into areas that hadn't ever seen any. thing like it. We used the examples that had been given to us by the miners and other workers, and we carried the fight throughout the area of North Wales. We also carried the banner of trade unionism. We were fighting to get people to join the trade union movement as well as to come out on strike.
FIVE MONTHS LATER ...
In February of this year six men were arrested and taken to Shrewsbury prison. The next day eighteen more were charged. There were 208 charges laid aguinst these 24 workers - over. kill" 1 think the Yanks call it. The main charge which everyone of them faces is 'that you on the 6th day of September at Shrewsbury .. wrongfully and without legal authority intimidated diverse people with a view to compelling these people to abstain from their lawful work, contrary to section 7 of the Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act, 1875 as amended". When we were first presented with these charges we immediately went to the people who told us to come out on strike - the trade union officials. One official from UCATT came down and said UCATT won't defend you on the criminal charges. But one man who stole sticks on this site five years ago got his brothers to collect for him and hired a solicitor - I'd advise you to do that." This was the same man who three months before had been saying to us get our and picket, don't sit around the house!
This is the advice we got from our leaders'. Now you may say, they're not really your lead. ers. But these lads looked on them as their leaders. These were the people who had asked them to come out on strike in the first place. You can imagine how neglected and unprotected they felt when the people they expected to protect them just dismissed their problem and compared them with a man who had stolen slicks, OUR MOVEMENT Anyway, they had abandoned us, so we started a movement ourselves. We began to build it up, and we started to become aware of what was going on. IF anyone thought that this was just the trial of a few bullding workers going a bit datt on one picket, they had i fine example at Shrewsbury on 15 March of just how far this Red Weekly 13 July 1973 Page 4