Monday, January 24, 2011

British Light Steel Pressings (BLSP) Acton Strike 1961


British Light Steel Pressings (Rootes Group) at Warple Road, Acton strike entered it's 12th strike against redundancies and work sharing at Acton (West London) factory, according to the Daily Worker 18th November 1961

600 men and women union members meet at Ealing Town Hall on the 17th November 1961 and agreed almost unanimously (1 vote against 3 abstained) to continue until the workers received a "fair and Honorable settlement".

At the conclusion of the meeting the audience broke into a rendition of "Solidarity Forever" song, which had become a tradition during the strike.
The union members while solid had meet with indifference from right winger Engineering Union (AEU) President William Carron. The Acton factory was during the strike only producing 200 sets rather usual 3,000 sets - BLSP
produced car body shells for cars such as the Hillman

Reg Hooper was the Joint Union Dispute Chairman at British Light Steel Pressings Acton

A spate of 82 mainly unofficial strikes in 1961 caused the loss of over 27,000 man hours at the BLSP plants.

BLSP formed in 1930.