'They're trying to treat us like slaves -now we're going to stand up for our rights.' That was the reaction of one of Leyland's Longbridge workers to the attempts of BL management to chop workers' tea breaks.
The company claims that the cut in tea breaks is needed to pay for the 39-hour week. But in reality Edwardes and BL management are trying to use the recent defeat of BL workers over the annual wage claim to put the boot in.
They want to force up productivity through increasing the speed of the track to backbreaking proportions, and making tea breaks so short that there's not even time to have a pee!
But Edwardes' attempts to ride rough-shod over the unions and the workforce has come a cropper. The attempt to get the workers back to work failed miserably last Monday when an extra 2000 workers joined the strike.
The extraordinary solidarity and determination of the Longbridge workers shows that they ve had enough of speed up, cuts in real wages and redundancy.
The hard line of BL management fits in nicely with the 'get tough' union-bashing policies of the Tories. Over the past few years, Edwardes has been in the forefront of the campaign to weaken union organisation. Derisory pay increases, plant closures with huge redun-dancies, and the sacking of militants - including former Longbridge convenor Derek Robinson - have been the order of the day for BL workers.
The battle for union rights means defeating the Employment Act and the new proposals b Employment,Secretary Norman Tebbit. But i also means repelling direct assaults on workers' rights like the one at Longbridge. Tebbit, Ed. wardes - on 'yer bike.