Kmflett's Blog

Wapping dispute started 24^th January 1986, 40 years on…

Like the miners’ strike of 1984/5, the Wapping print strike of 1986 was one of the iconic labour movement battles of the Thatcher era, and one of the biggest defeats.

Rupert Murdoch sacked thousands of printers and other skilled workers who produced the S*n, the Times and the Sunday Times. He moved operations to Wapping in East London (part of the start of the ‘renovation of the docklands…) and introduced then new technology. The papers were then produced by scab members of the EEPTU the old electricians union, now part of Unite (which is not responsible for that clearly).

The dispute led to regular Saturday night mass pickets with the aim of stopping lorries going out with the Sunday Times (Murdoch later learnt that lesson. The News International production plant is now on the M25 at the intersection of the ‘red route’ that runs up from Tottenham Hale).

I was 29 in January 1986 already a seasoned socialist and an activist in the Society of Telecom Executives (now part of Prospect) which despite the name and arguably because of the managers and professionals represented, was a left leaning TUC affiliated union.

My memory of the Saturday pickets was that they were a tumultuous affair with struggles with the police which tbh were very familiar from the miners strike. The other abiding memory was having a beer in the nearby Artful Dodger pub, where Keir Starmer was also to be found (I didn’t meet him I don’t think though we have mutual acquaintances)

The strike resonates 40 years on because it was a battle for how the world of work was going to develop. The new technology was coming but was it going to be on the employers terms or on the terms of the people who would operate it. The same battles are now being faced over AI