Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Interviewer – italic text
Interviewee – normal text
Transcription problem (inaudible/unclear) – text within [] is my guess of what was said in
the context of the conversation or “?”.
I said, “Look Dick, don’t wind this up,” I said. “I’m not wasting my time.” I said, “I find that I am
putting forward views that my organisation have not, you know, cottoned onto 100%,” so eh…
Anyway, after a time, it eh…it sort of folded up because there was people talking about what they
were going to try and do. [?] then [?], in the [end]. But, you see, then we started, in the ASW,
looking [?]. We had one with the plasterers, oh, very nearly tied up, and then all of a sudden,
they got a better offer and [?].
Yeah. That would have been about, what, ’66, ’67?
Em…in the…in the early-‘60s, something like that, yeah. Then we eh…we got talking with the
em…with the painters, and that was going fairly well. So, we had a number going on at the same
time, so we had a chat with the Woodcutting Machinists. Well now, that took [off pretty good],
and in fact, I remember…it would be about ’64, something like that, we had a meeting with the
Executive of the Woodcutting Machinists, and I said, “Now, is there anything else that you can
think of, lads, that you want to put before us?” The Woodcutting Machinists’ chap got up, thanked
us very much, and said, “Well, you’ve conceded everything we’ve asked for, we can see nothing
that’s going to retard us from signing the [deed of transfer],” you see. But [he] underestimated
what somebody else…little Alfie Tomkins of the furnishing trade, nice little old boy, but he was
very shrewd, like his [race]. He was very shrewd, and he made an offer to an officer in the [?]
machinery which eh…then… We knew of it because eh…I had to say to him, “Look, we can’t use
our rules in that way – our rules don’t allow us to go that way.”
What sorts of issues were being discussed then – you know, was it money or…?
Well, the thing is that it was eh…their pension rights, you see, to give them, which…it’s become
commonplace now, but, at that time, we hadn’t got a proper pension scheme. When I say we
hadn’t got a proper pension, men were…the pension was £3 a week, and it was £3 a week from
1947 up to 1960-something – it was still £3, and then they made it five. Well, now, because they
were – for instance, in the Plasterers, it was a far superior pension scheme that they were on.
Now, after all is said and done, a man’s looking at it and thinks to himself, “Well, what does it
matter? Here or there, it’s still amalgamation, getting together, and that’s what happened.” Well,
now, with the Woodcutting Machinists, the next thing we knew that, oh my God, we were…you
know, it was…and it was all done, with NAFTO.
You had talks in about 1964/65, the TUC came in, didn’t they, and they sort of said, well, why
don’t you all three get together and start talking?
Ah, well, every now and then, you would get the TUC calling people together, and the eh…us, the
woodcutting machines, the polishers, em…polishers…yeah…[it would be] those four, four or five.
Well now, the polishers of course, there was a terrible incident here with the General Secretary,
who was a man of very, very strict discipline [on] himself, and he was told he’d got to – I’ll put it
this way: he was told he’d got to bend the knee, and he wouldn’t do it, old Frank wouldn’t do it.
He said, “You take me for what I am – you either accept me or that’s it.” Well, of course, and
eh…then…they got a new General Secretary, a nice enough young fellow, who was coming with
us – he was another one, and then, all of a sudden, he was promised that he would get [?]
section, and [?] at the time, and lo and behold, away that one went. So, you’ll find this in a
number of cases.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
For instance, I don’t kid myself that the Painters, for instance – they came in to us, with us,
because they saw that we were, at that time, we’d got a pension scheme through the Scottish
[Equitable], which was carried by annuities so there was no question of any danger, you see.
Ours was always subject to the funds in the Society. It was a terrible drain on the Society’s
funds, and they couldn’t pay out benefit and they couldn’t pay out any pensions, but we’d altered
that fact. Well, now, the Painters had done this years before with an insurance company, but it
was in a very small way, and when they saw that ours was in modern line of thinking, that you
could get eh…you could go up to two-thirds of your salary, you see, they thought this was [?], and
we just got it done in the ‘70s, [?], and we got it through. That’s why the Painters came in – I’m
certain of that.
They were very keen on coming in with you…
Oh yes!
Because I’ve looked at the records of the Federation, where the…there’s a working party
continues through the mid-‘60s, and about 1965, you find that the main unions, the AUBTW, the
Painters, and then you find ASTRO and one or two of the smaller ones, seven of them altogether,
talking about amalgamation. But the Painters say, in the middle of all their discussions, oh well,
we think we’ve got much more in common with the Woodworkers, because of course they’re in
shipbuilding and we’re in shipbuilding, so really, we think we’ve got interests in line with them.
But I wondered if this was a reason – I wasn’t looking at pensions, to be honest, but just that you
had more money?
Well, the thing is that, at that time, you see, this was part of my break-up of this working party,
because we had, as you say, those few with the AUBTW saying, well, we’re making pretty good
progress, we’re getting – they were doing a lot of talking, but they hadn’t got far. You see, the
Painters was in with that, because they believed in the eh…the one union for the building industry
– you know, they were sold on this idea. But then, even they, to sever themselves from the
others, which were…let’s put it mostly trowel trades, they said, well, we’re more appropriate to the
ASW, but I’m talking about when you get down to the nitty-gritty, I’m certain that that had an
effect. You see – and I don’t think the AUBTW would have been so keen to come in with the
ASW&P if it hadn’t been that, eh…well, you’ve only got to make a comparison of salaries. The
salaries that the AUBTW were on [?] was pretty [rough].
Sorry, do you mean the salaries that their members got or their full-time officials?
Salaries to full-time officials. Their full-time officials, I mean, eh…the…AGS, for instance, which
was… I’ve still got papers upstairs. That’s why I argued with the [?] for a time, after the
amalgamation. I said, “Now, look [here, Bill], don’t push your luck too far,” I said, “because, look,
if you don’t realise it, I do – you’ve doubled your bloody salary, you’ve come into a far more
solvent organisation, so don’t push your luck.” Because he was…he wanted to suddenly become
the heir to all the [?], and eh, that’s what attracted them. In the end, they run for cover, admitted
there was only two places for them to go – that was the ASW and the T&G. Well now, if you
study any of the craft unions [laughing], they were opposed to going in with the T&G or the
General Municipal, which they…there could be no craft, you see. Well, now, the only thing that
drove the Plasterers, which caused trouble for us, was because [Alfie Dunn], old Alfie, lovely old
man, but of course he was well on retiring age, and eh, he got a better bargain from the Transport
& General, where they could do it – let’s face it, they could do it. It was like, eh…going into a
huge company and saying, well, do you think I can have a company car, as against a man with a
little engineering shop round the back here – he’s going to say to you, “Well, look, I can’t afford it
– build the business up and you can have it.” But, eh, the likes of a big company, “Oh yes, I think
we could manage that,” if they wanted to of course, you see. Well, that was the way with the
T&G, but we couldn’t do it, you see, and eh… You’ll see that a certain official of the Woodcutting
Machinists is now back in his native [?], I think, and he’s in his own house, which he never had
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
when [?]. Well, the same thing will apply to Georgie Smith. When he comes up to Scotland,
when he retires next year, he will be [dealt with] very generously by people, who have let him do
what he could have done himself, and I advised him to do, oh, a good many years ago, in 1958.
He didn’t want to do it then, but as he gets nearer the age of [going], he said, “Oh, I wish I’d have
done that,” but eh… You see, when they do these things, they should remember that people that
have done it before them, they may turn round and say, “Oh, big – got your own house!” and all
that, but people that have done it a long while back, they haven’t done it without, you know, sort
of…
A bit of a fight…
Absolutely, and denying theirselves some little things that they haven’t. So, and of course, the
eh…the ASTRO, you mentioned ASTRO… Well, now, old Laurie Poupard, their General
Secretary, he believed in closer unity, and he thought to himself, well, [while I’ve] been without it, I
think the AUBTW, the bricklayers are…next to us. He went in – there was no…no argy-bargy
there, none at all. I mean, he eh…old Laurie was that type of chap, you see, and when he’s
come in, I would say, of the officials that come over to the ASW and UCATT, that people look and
say, oh, you know, he’s done his fair share. There’s two people, to my mind, that [worked their
soul case] out when they came here. One’s gone – that’s little Freddy [Flynns], for the packingcase workers. He came in and threw himself, right in the deep-end for work. And Laurie Poupard
is the same. But then, there are the sort of chaps that you…that you meet up, as they’re sort of
looking at it what’s in it for…you know, ultimately…and unfortunately, that affected quite a bit of
this amalgamation business, you see, because if they live to be a thousand, the likes of Harry
Weaver, who was the Bricklayers’ President, Jim Mills, who was the Chairman of the
Woodworking Executive for a spell, they…might eh…think that they did something, but I don’t
think they did. I think the architect, the power, was old Dick Coppock. Some of them might not,
now, speak, you know, a good word of the man, but, as far as I was concerned, I could see the
work old Dick had done, and he wasIt was 40 years, wasn’t it?
Oh, and he was…and he was such a marvellous man like. You see, I don’t know how other
people take him, but Dick was mates of Richard Coppock. I remember the first time I met him,
you know, after [inaudible]. “Hello – and how are you this morning, son?!” So I said, em, “Alright,
Dick – how are you?” So he said, “Oh, not bad.” But you see what I’m getting at? He came up
and broke the ice and really made it simple for me, but in the excitement, you know, when he
said, “Good morning, Sir, and how are you?” I said to him [laughing], “Alright Dick, and how are
you?”
I’ll tell you another thing, and this gives you the measure of the man. The first time I went to the
General Council, which was the Federation’s General Council – it was representatives from all
the unions that met quarterly to discuss policy. Dick had held it together, and I had realised how
he held it together, you see. He used to dish out the expenses sheets – you see, it always used
to be held up in York, and eh…[?] York, returned to York, I knew that, see, so [I put that down].
Then, delegations [they didn’t know]. I thought to myself, [?], I was here last night, I’m here
today, and [?] – what is it? So I was in a quandary. Around comes little Dick – he was only [?]
and he come round the back [of me]. “You having trouble, Youngie?” So I said, “Yeah, well, to
tell you truth, Dick,” I said, “what’s the delegation [like]?” I said, “Are we going on tomorrow?” He
said, “It’s always been the same – three nights and two days.” So I said, “Oh.” He said, “Yes,
that’s what happens - three nights, two days,” he said, “so it’s three overnights and two days.” He
said, “None of these other buggers will tell you,” he said, [?]. You see, well now, it got to the
stage that old Dick was able, via that, to get through, get things moved that otherwise people bite
their fingers and say, oh well, we want to adjourn that and have another adjournment, you know.
I only remember once Dick saying, “Oh well, it’s up to you to make up your bloody minds. I
booked this room for two days, and you can stop here for two days if you like [later].” And very
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
quickly then, someone, you know, that was being a bit, “Well, I don’t know…” they could see the
wisdom of the move and would come to agreement pretty sharpish so that they’d catch at least
the five o’clock train from York, you know.
You see, well now, I didn’t underestimate old Dick even in those days. I thought to myself, you’re
a shrewd old man, mate – you know what it takes. And to see him in action when we were
negotiating with the employers, I mean old Dick [?]. The last negotiations I was with him was…he
was knocking on a bit then, but he was just as much, you know, [?] in my opinion, you know, as
ever he was from the beginning, you know, whereas some other people wasn’t. And of course,
Dick used to watch the…going on, and he used to threaten some people by walking round and
getting in their presence, [inaudible], and other people thought it was a great idea, you see.
So, of course, eh, as far as Harry Weaver and Mills are concerned, on records, Mills was
President of the Federation for a long time, and so was Harry Weaver as Secretary. He was from
1961 I think it was till [?]. But the marvellous people at the Federation was Harry [Fine], the
Research Officer,[?], who would come in like an absent-minded professor, [inaudible], popping in
and out, Mrs Jones, whose husband was [inaudible], and she had to work – she was the
secretary, an absolutely dedicated woman and who knew the business from A to Z, and the other
chap that looked after the money, what was his name…[?] – they were the people that run..
Harry [Weaver] and Jim Mills were sitting around in the Queen Arthur or the Duke of…and the
work still went on. They’re the people that did. It’s always been the case that there’s a few
dedicated people who’ve…who’ve done the business, you know.
Do you think the Federation actually helped the process of amalgamation after Dick Coppock
went? Because the working party was actually carried out through the Federation, wasn’t it?
Yeah. Well, it was, insomuch as that the feeling was there. There’s no denying that the feeling
was there, in the Woodworkers, and I would say the Woodworkers’ membership were the hardest
lot because of this old craft standards, you know – he’s only a painter, you know, [?], you know,
but I am, you know, [?]. So, we were a bit, eh, backward, but even in ours, as I say, that em,
conference, where they agreed that the Executive should look into… You see, there was no
eh…no doubt about it that… Any sensible person could see that the way it was going was
through there, and of course, Harry realised this, and that working party, as I say, we tried, and I
tried, but in the end, I said, no, look, this is…a waste of time, just [?], you see.
It seemed, for a long while, you get the…the ASW, I mean, George Smith, in 1960/61, was saying
what we expect to be happening is amalgamation with cognate trades, and he was talking about
really – I mean, I don’t know if it was just in terms of straight money, in other words that the
ASWM and NAFTO, they were better off financially, or whether it was as well that, you know, it
was easier perhaps to put your members in with people who are doing similar kinds of jobs,
because NAFTO had unskilled sections, didn’t it? So, you know, I wasn’t certain about that.
Ah yes, but the thing is this, that…don’t like that blind you, because, early on, we were worried
when it came to the construction industry, the trainees who were coming in, and eh, I would say,
in the main, the people that had been on the Executive in my time [?] were tradesmen, were
actual tradesmen at one the time. So, therefore, they realised, more than anybody, that the trade
was losing its mystique. You see, this…people will laugh about…you can’t make – I’ve said it
myself about, oh, 40 years ago, it takes all of five years to make a carpenter, see, but I’ve got to
admit that this six-weeks concentrated course does marvels, and we realised that. So, therefore,
you’ve got, what, transference from unskilled to skilled in a very short space of time. Well, now,
we had large factories where there would be…for instance, I remember, [up in the North], [?] they
were making these cabinets for television and wireless, cabinets, [?]. Now, the [?] didn’t want to
use sharp-edged tools. They were perfectly happy to have these pieces that come off the
machine, sticking them, gluing them together, papering them [?] afterwards. Some of them would
use a machine sander and push it [over], you know. Others would eh…just go over it with a
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
[rubber, sandpapering]. They were satisfied and they were making them, because machines had
got such that, once the parts come up, it was like sticking a jigsaw together, you see. Well now,
we had to accept that we’d got to succumb to some arrangement there for…a rate for a sort of
semi-skilled, partially-skilled person, you see, when it was [?] males. Now, we’d got over it by
saying, oh well, it’s females, you see. You know, why? Because we couldn’t do it for males
because our members were saying, “There’s only one rate, the craft rate, for males!” But when
we slipped in and said, “Well, oh no, these are females,” the [joineresses], ah well, that was a
different thing and they accepted them, you see. So we knew that the sections had got to change
over, so, not having an unskilled section didn’t matter so much. It did originally. I don’t know if
you went back as far as when we amalgamated with Sam Reading and the packing-case
workers?
Yes.
Well, when we amalgamated with Sam, we said to Sam, look Sam, we’ll take – and his Executive,
there were a few Executive chaps there, but it was Sam that was in the main…he was the [?], you
know, and [well], Sam, if it’s alright. Eh, said to Sam, well look, we can’t take your unskilled
section, Sam. If they like, they can go to the T&G, tell the T&G [?], but if there’s some of them [?],
we’ll make a section, and we put them in I think it was trainee section [laughing], section four at
that time, because it was a question of the contributions they paid, and said, well, there you are,
they can go in there, Sam. But afterwards, some years afterwards, we realised that Sam’s
section, if we’d have taken [them over], would have been very handy for us, you see, and in fact,
now, switch that off…
[Recording cuts]
One of the basic problems is just sort of recruitment, when you’ve got people moving around from
one site to another.
Yeah.
But I wondered if that was a difference between like you and maybe the Bricklayers and the
Painters, in that a lot of your members would either be based around somewhere fairly
permanent, like they’d be in a workshop or something, or else they – I mean, I know you had a lot
of members in Ministry of Labour establishments, in dockyards and places like that, where they’re
permanent – you had a lot of people who were permanent members anyway.
Ah yes, yes, yes. You had the…the hard core in the actual...but you’ve got to remember that
there’s a hell of a lot of… The old-fashioned way was [?] carpenters, that eh…was on this job
and onto the next job, but remained loyal to the organisation, you see. I mean, whereas…it’s not
the same… For instance, bricklayers, because of the…period of the War and after the War,
because of the period that, well, the more you did, the more you got, you see, sort of task work – I
wouldn’t say piecework, but task work, because the Federation made it that there was no
piecework, you see, because this is the basic work, as I say, old Dick Coppock will never get the
credit for. He got a basic rate for the building industry that every bricklayer enjoyed, but, you see,
bricklaying is a very easy trade to turn round and say, well, there’s so many [lots of] brickwork in
that house, I’ll give you so much for it, and they were doing extraordinarily well at it, and so of
course, the benefit of the trade union, the use of the trade union [went], you see. Well, now, I
don’t know if they did what we have done, I don’t know about the last few years. Since I’ve
retired, [maybe it’s] eased off a bit. But we used to have, in the regions, and in London, I could
show you where we used to have these schools, weekend schools, and get a mass of
apprentices in, and eh, tell them the…the story of the trade unions and politics of, you know…
We used to get, I mean, Vic Feather – Vic Feather was a personal friend [of mine], because of
the number of…originally, right from the time I was first appointed full-time official, back in [‘44],
Vic was coming along to these schools as the…Assistant Assistant Secretary, you know, and
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
then he was the Assistant Secretary for years, and then, of course, we used to get people like
Gaitskell, eh, company up Oxford, come down to eh…down in Surrey, [?]. Have you been to [?]?
Yes.
Well now, we used to have them regularly there, at weekends, and there was the summer school
[weeks] at Oxford. We even had that two…two weeks running, [at periods of time], but we used
to have these weekend schools where you used to be drumming it in, and I think that the idealism
was put into the…that they accepted it and [?], you see. Some, of course, don’t benefit [by it],
and slipped the other way. For instance, there’s one fellow, [?] at the present time, and indeed
retired in the last five years, but eh, [inaudible]. He swung over, which is my right hand, we
swung way over the [?], you see.
Yeah.
And of course, there’s been an embarrassment now, for instance, because, eh, he gets selected
to go places, you see, and he [can say that] he’s a member of the Labour Party. This is what
grieves me. But he’s only one in dozens that came in and did benefit from it, and I think that
we…we changed a lot of even the left-wing people’s attitude by, eh, getting these sort of people
to talk to them. Well, now, I don’t…old Dick started it in the Federation just before he em…turned
over to Harry Weaver. Before that, the…Federation never had any school, propaganda school,
used to get old Dick [though would] speak, and of course old Dick was like Norman Kennedy,
which is long before your time, but Norman Kennedy was a young, supposedly [?] and he used to
[?], but he was gifted insomuch as that he could em…address a meeting of people and
everybody would listen to every word he said, you know, and he’d do a great thing for the
movement. How I know this is, before this toerag got in [for Poplar], I think it was Charlie
[Keyes]… It was either Charlie [Keyes] or the chap whose father was in before him, [?], eh, the
election. They’d asked Kennedy to go down and speak, and Norman come to me and he said,
“Here,” he said, “[?].” He says, “You know all about [?] the docks.” He said, “Talk to me about
the docks.” I said, “What do you want me to talk about?!” Anyway, I blathered on [?] dockers,
and [instead of] concentrating on these dockers, what [?] dockers, [?], what the different docks
were for, you see – [West India] Dock, you know, [?] sugar and [?], and the Russian ships [?].
Well, I didn’t realise the significance of this before the election was on and it was over, and I used
to go down the docks a lot in those days. You know, I was down the docks [on the Sunday], and
[one of dockers] said, “Hey, cor blimey, Jack boy, who’s that bloke from your lot, Scotch man?!” I
said, “What do you mean, Scotchman?” Well, there was only one, I said, “That must be Norman
Kennedy.” “That’s the bloke!” he said. “He ought to have been our MP, mate,” he said. “There’s
a man,” he said, “understands the docks and understands our way of life!” Now, Norman knew
no more about the docks, but he had a gift. He was like Nye Bevan. I don’t know if you ever had
the luck to listen to Nye Bevan, but Nye had that…had a gift, and so did Norman Kennedy. And
eh, oh, he was – and so did Dick Coppock, you see. Dick Coppock was a man – I don’t know if
you’ll ever hear it during your lifetime, or if you’ve ever heard it up till now. He had a big meeting
[?], Federation meeting. They didn’t call [me], but they called one [?], [?] now, and of course, [?]
was all [?], and eh, old Dick got up, and this bloke got up, going [?]. Well, little Dick stood up
[laughing] and he says, “Now, look here, brother, you’ve come here to listen to me! I haven’t
come here to bloody well listen to you, so now sit down or I will!” and with that, Dick sat down.
This bloke dried up and [everything went dead], but eh…that was, you know…and of course, eh,
Dick handled some marvellous… He was, he was a bricklayer, you know. There’s no affinity
between me and him, but now, I don’t know if you ever read Terson’s, the great dispute at
Terson’s?
No.
Well, there was a special pamphlet got out by the Federation, “Terson’s – the Facts”, and I went
down with Ernie Jones – it was in North Camden, a big housing site. Ernest Jones used to be the
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Regional Secretary in London. I went down [one week because I think he was getting a bit of a
hard time], so I went down to meet the stewards there. [?], “Here brother, we ain’t having none of
him!” you see – this was Ernie Jones, see. I said, “Look, I wouldn’t say that if I was you,” I said,
“because, before long, you may find I’m a bloody sight worse than he is, so now, let’s, you know,
get down to [cases].” Well, old Dick produced this pamphlet, on “Terson’s – the Facts”, and we
got that…it was the time when the LCC was going, and we went and met em…the famous chap
who was Chairman of the LCC…and eh…[inaudible]. It was such a bloody great estate of
houses was being built, you know, for a few people who were stirring it up, see – Geoff [?] and a
few more. But eh, old Dick did a masterful job there. Now, old Dick wouldn’t, eh, get all heated
up, you know. Old Dick would say, “Well, they’ve got a point of view,” but it would be sorted out
and gradually, you would…it would come upon you, what old Dick’s plan is, you know [laughing],
but he would never – he was never a devious man that called people together and gave them a
plan. Harry Weaver [would, ?], but never Dick. But he did it nevertheless, and this is where
Harry Weaver learnt off like, but Harry Weaver, he didn’t have the guile of Dick to mastermind it.
Harry used to get us all together and say would we [help him]. Of course, I mean, [?], I used to
say, yeah, fair enough, Harry, [?], to eh…tie things up.
Was it…I came across a reference to the unifying of rates and hours, just around the late-‘50s,
early-‘60s time. That must have been Dick Coppock’s doing, was it?
Oh yes.
Would be just before… What happened, because, you see, I’m not…I’m not familiar enough with,
you know, with the wage structure in the building industry at the moment, and I had the
impression that there was a unified structure from about 1924.
No, no, no. In 1924, there was…national negotiations, but there were, oh God knows how many
rates. Everybody got a different rate. And it was, you’re right, in about the ‘50s, sometime in the
‘50s…wait a minute, I’ve got some things ready that I knew you’d be…
My memory ain’t quite as quick as yours, you see, and yours ain’t too fast when you – you know
where you got mixed up?
Yeah.
You put down Friday, the 8th, didn’t you?
Yeah, I know – I’m getting…I don’t know [laughing], short on memory!
Oh, you’ve seen that, have you?
Yes. I’ve got a copy of that.
Got it?
Yes.
I was going to say, you could have had that one.
Oh, that’s nice of you. I’ve already got one.
Now then, have you got this? Now, that…there you are…sit down… That tells you the story, and
we can find out in there… Just a minute, I’m perhaps more used to that…. That’s just [the] kids,
you know, youngsters, but you can’t think [of everything], and they used to have this [?] then.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
There you are…there’s the rates…from ’45… But wait a minute, I’m sure here… You’ll find it in
there, somewhere, that there were, God knows how many rates in the… It’s in here somewhere,
I’m sure. Anyway, the eh…the number of rates there were, there’s A, B, C…oh, God knows
what.
And that would be like a regional rate?
Oh, here we are! We’re coming onto it. The grades originally numbered, there you are, 17, D4
being the lowest. So that was A1, A2, B1, 2, and C, down to D4. There were 17 rates. Well, in
em…where’s this again…? You see, in em…where is it…about…oh, 50-somewhere here, there
was only two rates or there was three – people will argue with you there’s three. There wasn’t,
really. There were two rates: that was the national grade A rate, which they’ve got now; and the
London and Liverpool. You see, but London and Liverpool are the same rate, so there’s only two.
But at that time, there was the…the time I’m talking about there, when there was 17, there was
the London rate, Inner London rate and the Outer London rate, you see. So if you lived, eh, 15
miles from Charing Cross, then you was worth a h’penny less than the other bloke, you see.
Right, yeah.
Now, that’s…that’s very handy, that one.
So what happened, they went over to just like one craftsman’s rate for the whole of the country?
That’s right, and that’s what it is now.
Yeah.
Em… Now, there is the last meeting, you see… There’s nothing in it… If you want to take it and
look at it, you can, as long as you send it to me back. You see, this is the actual last meeting of
the winding up of the Federation.
Oh right, yeah. Yeah, I’d like to have a look at that actually.
Now, this is the first one, where it was going to finish it, but we didn’t. For some reason, we said,
well… I think it was, em, somebody’s house hadn’t been sold or something. Oh no… We
had…what’s the Federation’s office?
Cedar House?
Cedar…Federal House, Cedar’s Road. That had got to be sold. Well now, that’s…that’s
something else that gives you…an idea how that [?].
Now, this one, this one, if you want to know about the rates, but I don’t know as you would be,
see…there’s the grading of rates in [‘50], right?
Yeah.
Now, there’s how it applied. You see, wherever you lived, you had to look at this book to find out
what your rate was, you see, and there are the number of rates. Well, now, old Dick changed all
that, you see.
But would that have been…?
But there’s nothing in that really.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Like the…would the bricklayers have got one rate at the same time as the woodworkers did?
Oh yes, yes, yes.
So that, in fact, there was a simplification and a, you know, standardisation of rates right across
the building industry?
Yes. As far as the bricklayers, plumbers and painters were concerned, it was all the one price,
you see.
Yeah. Because that, yeah, I mean, I wondered if that would affect actually people’s attitude to
amalgamation, in that, if you’re all getting the same rate, it makes that much more sense all to be
working from the same office, all to be recruiting into the same organisation, you know, and to
have the same kind of back-up facilities.
Yeah, true. True. But then, you know what retarded men from this, don’t you? And I don’t know if
it’s in that little book of Dick’s there, [?], you might type some of it out…
Yeah, I’d like to have a look at it.
Well, now, the thing was this, that I was a carpenter, right? All the timber came in with me. Then,
alright, they brought out [patent] plasterboard – I fixed that. [Are you following it?] I fixed that,
okay. A plumber wants to run a pipe through here. I clip it up, screws you see, screwdriver, I clip
it up. Well now, the thing was, and you can see it in so many instances, for instance, in
shipbuilding, you had the coppersmith and the plumber, both doing exactly the same job. The
only thing is one was using copper and the other was using steel or lead. But, [?], you’d have a
plumber working on the job and you’d have a coppersmith working on the job, but if we
amalgamate, this was the burning…that was burning in the men’s souls. This is where they talk
about demarcation. I once went to Manchester University – they got me there to speak on… It
was the time of the Hull [building] strike, on demarcation, and I said, yeah, but you are looking at
it in [?] and modern people are looking at it, well, we’ve got to get water from that point to there –
it doesn’t matter really…I mean, let the chap do it and let him be well-paid, but why should he
argue? But the thing is that, way back in those days, it meant a job for a plumber and a job for a
coppersmith, it meant a job for a joiner and it meant more work for the joiner, you see.
For instance, I remember, many years ago, going to Jarrow, eh…Jarrow, you know, where
eh…what’s-it’s-names are….
Shipyards…?
Vickers. For the Council, Jarrow Council, and eh…it was a question of [?], fixing some
plasterboard, you see, which was [?]. [They said] but these plasterers, you know, we’ll have to
get rid of the plasterers for the skim, final skim, you see. So, I [felt] that it was carpenters’ work.
Once – I said, look, once you accept with me the idea it’s carpenters’ work, then let’s get to that
spot first. Well, old Grogan, the Plasterers’ President – he was President of the Plasterers at that
time, he couldn’t [agree with me] at all. No! I said, “Look, [Arthur], get [them] to agree that, and
after all is said and done, it’s only [inaudible]. …by the Federation and the employers, [?] said
there’s agreed principles to where a plumber puts the screws in the brackets and all the rest. It
was all written down. It’s gone now. I said to him, “But once you concede that, then I will turn
round and agree that none of your chaps should be sent down the road – they can go on fixing
plasterboard until there’s sufficient for them to skim.” Ooh…took him a long while… I said, “Now
look, that’s…I’m proving to you that my blokes – I’ll get my blokes to agree with it, and my blokes
are not anxious to see your blokes out of work, but what they are anxious to do is to maintain
their right.” And if you look in the industry, you’ll find that that…used to motivate people – not
now, and although the point you were making was we were all getting the same rate, yes, but you
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
see, if it meant, [even ?], if it meant [there was a good building job], and there was a lot of glass
there, and it was beaded, it was a carpenter’s work, so it meant the carpenters got another three
weeks’ work putting that glass in with beads. Now, if it was puttyed in, the painter would putty
glaze it, and that would mean three weeks work more for the painters. You see, so, you’ve got to
remember that was at the back of people’s minds when they were thinking of this, which – I’m
talking about the ordinary men, where they wasn’t so enamoured with joining up with some other
trade, not that they disliked the blokes, but those things, you know, what you had, you [owned].
But when it got down to the nitty-gritty there of these meetings where we were discussing
amalgamation, I don’t think that affected it at all because, then, what advantage was it to my
organisation, you see. Eh, thank God, in the end, commonsense prevailed, but the only reason I
say that is because, as far as construction is concerned, it’s getting now that you’ve only got one
organisation [to deal with], you see. Unfortunately, [for a] number of organisations, you get
something that reasonable people would…could accept as a settlement, but you can’t do it
because some little [piddle-pot] of a section say, “Oh no, I don’t agree!”
But did that…could that have changed – I mean, the 1960s was like the real…it was real heyday
for the building, wasn’t it? The Labour Government was promising 500,000 houses a year and all
this stuff. Buildings going up [all over] – London changed so much in the ‘60s, it’s unbelievable.
Was that a reason perhaps for people not fearing maybe the loss of their jobs so much? I mean,
for almost 10 years, you’d got, you know, people knowing that when this job was finished, they’d
got something to go onto, and perhaps they’d move on before because there’s something better
going on anyway.
Yeah, true, true. That’s true, and that’s commonsense. But you’ve got to remember that there
are a lot of young women that em…get these electric, what do they call them, [Molinade] mixer
things, you see, but they say, “Oh, no, my old Mum did it this way, whipping it up with a fork,” so
they still, even to today, they’re still doing it with a fork, whereas I would turn round and say, well,
let’s use the machine so you can be doing something else. But you see, old habits die very, very
hard, you see, and I would say, even up to the War, and well after the War, I was beset with
demarcation problems which I had a hell of a job to…to try and get over.
Digressing for a minute, I don’t know if it’s still there…no, of course, it can’t be. You know
Beckton Gasworks?
Yeah.
You know that. Now, it was [?]. Now then, they had a machine, a drilling machine, in Beckton
Gasworks, in one of the shops, that was covered round with wire netting, and nobody used it.
You know why? There was an argument between the engineers and the pipefitters – in the
gasworks, they called them pipefitters, all the plumbers that went in and worked. There was a
section called the pipefitters. And, eh, oh, they don’t work that machine! And it had got to such
an impasse that they had to say, right, nobody will work that machine, and they didn’t take the
bloody thing out – it was left there. “Because it’s in our shop,” says the engineers… Well, that
was demarcation taken to an absolutely crazy bloody extent! But that’s a…and this was well after
the War, you see, so…unfortunately, that eh…it did hang on, but I would say it’s been…it’s no
bearing in the last, what, oh…10 or 15 years. I mean, because, 10 years before I retired, I could
have gone on any site, and come down like Lord High Admiral and said, “No, no, that’s…those
type of brackets can be fixed by the plumbers,” and I’d find some argument that, “Oh, no, no, no,
they’re made of plastic,” or something like that, and therefore they’re not metal and all the… And
our chaps, the majority of them would have said, “Okay, Jack.” Maybe one or two of them [would
have said], “Oh, you’re giving bloody work away!” [?], but eh, eh, that’s, you know, that’s by the
by. Whereas, years ago, well, they’d bloody lynch you! I mean, I’ve come through the time when
you were reading, and you have read, in that history [?], about PBR. Well, in 1947, I was a fulltime official, [?], and I went into [?] talking about payment by results, and there was no question –
it’s you get the basic rate, brothers, and if you do that more, well then you get more, but if you
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
don’t reach that target, well, [it don’t matter], you’ll get basic rates guaranteed anyway. [And I’m
getting on alright], because we had a hell of a job with the old ASW. We had members [inaudible]
because they wouldn’t [go on] PBR and all the rest. So, we decided we’d leave it to the factory,
leave it more to the entity, and I went to [?]. And good old Fred Thomson, I’ll never forget him, he
stood up here and he took his card out his pocket…”Brothers, I’m proud of this,” he said, tears
streaming down his face. He said, “Don’t let us sell out, brothers!” he said. “We’ve always stood
against piecework,” he said, “man against man!” So eh…he won the day. I put it to the vote.
They all – there might have been a couple, out of sheer loyalty to me, thought to theirself, hold
on, you know, and they were strong enough to stand the rebuffs of the other men, but the majority
of them went along with Fred Thomson. Well, they’re the sort of thing, you see, that old men like
Thomson carried on, you see, and eh… I mean, [it wouldn’t have affected him], God knows now, I
tried, [?], I tried to get them to accept things that are coming up, [?], because we’d got [painters in
the ranks now], and “I don’t know about that…” “Not a painter, is he?!” Well, he don’t have to
be…have an academic degree to put a coat of paint on some woodwork or something or some
ironwork in preparation for… You know, you don’t want a painter standing by all the time there,
not – you see, because I had a laugh and joke with them, saying, “Look, any self-respecting
painter, you know, that is a painter and decorator, to stand here at the behest of some bloke
saying “Put a dab on there”, “Put a dab on there”…?!” I’d say to them, you know, “Well, if I was –
I don’t know about you lads, because I’m past it now, but I’d say “Do it your bloody self – I’m not
your labourer!””
You see, well, that’s the sort of thing that you’d got to use to try and break down these things, you
see, and of course, the whole secret of…the trade union movement, from top to bottom, is that
you get forceful characters trying to force their will on people. Now, Bill [Canon], [to some] people
[inaudible] will speak with respect. Others will say, “Oh, I don’t know about him – he let the side
down!” Now, Bill [Canon] was a really fine man. He tried to see other people’s point of view.
You’ve got to remember that, on the confed, he held all the votes. He held nearly 800,000 votes
and I was sitting there, as a woodworker, with 32! You see… But, very often, there’d be
something in shipping, shipbuilding, I’d say, “Oh no, but Bill, I think…” and old Bill would say,
“Well, okay, yeah, well done – well, I’ll accept that amendment, Jack, if that’s worrying your
chaps.” He was absolutely a, you know, sold with the idea of trade unionism. But some of these
bloody people that you met in your life that are not, you see, and I’m talking about, in the main, in
the main, are these so-called left-wingers, not true left-wingers, because I can count in my circle
of friends Leo McCree, the famous Communist from Liverpool, that when I was acting GS, before
George Smith got the job, and em…[inaudible], because I was there for, what, six months doing
that, and then I was six months as…nine months as AGS, in the office, and of course, as AGS, if
you’re doing your job, you get all the problems, see, because the GS, he’s away busy
somewhere, and you get them. Of course, if you are not too anxious for work, you eh…
[End of Recording 1]
[Recording 2]
“What do you want me to do, gov?” I said, “Well, do your best [to get them back] – at least try,” I
said, “and I’ll be back tomorrow morning.” Now, there was a man, a Communist, member of the
Communist Party for, oh, about 30-odd years [by then], but he could always see the
commonsense of there comes to a certain point where you’ve got to say, well, alright, we live to
fight tomorrow. But you see, some of these daft people, they think that, eh, this is the Battle of
Hastings and it’s got to be won today, you see! This is what eh…and you get people, and
George Smith [is] one of them, who gets bees in his bonnet, and thinks that, well, this is it, this is
the answer, and [?]. And I’m going to say this, that George was on the side of not going into
[inaudible]. You used to have to say you will, if you’re going anywhere, you will [?]. Well, this
applied – for instance, you could laugh at me and say, look, how could the General Secretary of
the Woodcutting Machinists change his [EC, from this week, get] everything we’ve offered them,
to going in with…but I’m telling you, my dear, it was done, and it can be done.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
And it was done that quickly, was it?
Of course. It was done all in a rush and it was over before we knew where we were. Of course,
[?], to give Charlie [?] his due [laughing], Charlie was terribly indignant with me, [at] one place – I
forget what it was. I said to him, “Charlie,” I said, “I’m ashamed of you.” “You and your so-andso,” oh, he didn’t half give a mouthful, you know! So I said, “If that’s what you think, Charlie, well,
it’s just as well, but you know what, Charlie, [?].” Charlie had to do that so that other people
would say [?], telling Jack Youngs what he thought of [?]. Well, they thought to theirselves, oh
well, there you are, you see, [can’t get on, as you’d expect], but that was [?], and Charlie, since,
since then, after that, not so long after that, since then, has been one of my, well, closest
[advocates], I mean [?]. And I mean, even now, I meet – I shall meet Charlie in June, down in
Eastbourne, but eh, and we’ll get on the best of pals, you know, but that don’t alter the fact that,
sometimes, and I suppose, if I think again, what terrible harm has it done? I don’t see as it has
done any terrible harm because the day will come when [?] will have to come in, and I think the
only thing that’s [stopping it] now is this chap Ben [Rumina], [?], and that’s because…it’s not on
record because [?]. He’s one of these chaps put up [by the] Executive, but [they didn’t] do their
homework [about who they] get there, but then somebody invited [Rumina] to do the vote of
thanks to the Chairman [?]. What does he do? He says, “Oh, thank you very much for running
this conference like this, but you’ve all made a silly bloody mistake – why didn’t you put my man
on the Executive because we are this, that and the other,” and men that didn’t know what he was
all about says, “What’s this?” Well, of course, you don’t know [me], but you should have gathered
[?], turned round and said, “Well, what do you expect?!” [?] wants his bloke on because he’s a
member of the Communist Party, and this bloke’s been a member of the Communist Party for
God knows how long! He wants to get on here! And John [Boyd], you know, the chap…General
Secretary of the AEU, plays the two, [?], he turns to me and he says, “God, Jack, that was a near
escape!” you know, to such a man, you see, oh…
Yeah. Do you think that the…I don’t know, sometimes it seems like the sort of political overtone
of the ASW is, you know, middle of the road, if you like.
Yeah.
The AUBTW, [?], had a lot of Communist Party or ex-Communist Party people on its Executive,
didn’t it?
That’s true.
Was that a sort of feeling, perhaps, that, if you took them all in, you were going to be maybe a bit
swamped with it?
Eh, well, if we’d have had the sense that you’ve got to ask that question, we would have thought
that [way], but we didn’t! I think we were [laughing] big enough, big-headed enough, to think to
ourselves, oh well, we can control this lot. Old George Lowthian has, you see…
Yeah.
But what we didn’t know was this: you can only surmise since, but what did happen was, when
we had the difference on the Federation [?], for instance, and the likes of Bill Smart, Albert
Williams and these others wanted to go the other way, and John Thomas from Cardiff, the big tall
chap, good Labour man, always used to say, he’d come up and see me, “I don’t know what’s
happening here, Jack – oh-ho-ho!” But eh, and old George Lowthian used to [?], used to
say…”I’m telling you, this will go through [?] and you’ll be [?].” Well then, what would happen
would be that, eh, they’d come back and we’d have a vote, and there’d be a couple of diehards
would put their hand up against, but the rest, Johnny Leonard and George Lowthian, wouldn’t put
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
their hands up – that would be a bit high, you know. So we thought that we…if eh…George
Lowthian couldn’t move forward, we would [take] control, but events ain’t proving too good, are
they?
Well, I don’t know so much about what goes on now, but obviously it’s em…
Well, I suggest you read the Construction News.
I do, yeah, but eh….
Well, haven’t you read it, just recently?
Not for the last – not for the recent period.
I took eh…[voter stats], the pages out of the Construction News and the Contract Journal,
particularly the Contract Journal, because that’s [?] about people, and the last one says, well, it’s
happened, you see. Say what they like, you see, the last one on is Kelly, young Charlie Kelly,
and [?], always has been. Charlie’s never been [?], but quite a few years, Charlie has [nodded to
the goals] when they’ve said, oh, look, we should…oh, yeah. Oh yes. We should have all the [?]
that’s coming up, and a bit more, yeah, says Charlie [laughing]. But, the thing is, what worries me
is that Charlie’s got here via the support of the Party, you see, and the Party’s strength in our
organisation was about 8,000 in ’79 or ’72. Now, of course, it’s gone down to six. Our vote is still
somewhere round about 10, you see, which meant that we would have beaten Charlie cleverly,
but our people, you see, are so damn silly that we had three prominent people vying against one
another, and also three or four other little tiddlers that…well, they’d get a couple of hundred each,
but it’s all a couple of hundred that would have gone to our chap, you see. Because you can rest
assured – and this is what I envy, in my efforts, when I sat down and [I write] to people, I say, you
know, that this is the position, and I think that we should support so-and-so, and I used to – I
mean, after all is said and done, this last Executive, I didn’t select the candidate, the chaps up in
Scotland select [him]. I went up to Scotland [and met him], under my own power, and said, well,
who [may you be] suggesting, okay, I come back, and [I write then] all my friends throughout the
country and say, well, look, the lads have selected di-di-di, [?]. I’m going to leave it at that. Like
you say, the other people, the order goes out and that’s it, it’s carried out – it is carried out like a
semi-military organisation. It’s the same as the…it seems to me, it sounds to me the same with,
for instance, the Tories, who place out instructions for something to be done to their...and they
know their people are sending it through, they will do it. But our bloody…
For many years, the Party operated the paper, didn’t they, in the building industry?
Oh yeah.
Because we got hold of copies of that, the New Builders’ Leader.
The New Builders’ Leader, that’s right. That was…Geoff [Marvels] was the Secretary of that.
You see, that went on for years. And this Terson’s one I was telling you about, went down there,
and it was a huge site – I mean, near as big as East Ham, and the first thing that struck me on
this was, every now and then, [a stool], Daily Worker, New Builders’ Leader, and all the Party,
Communist Party propaganda, [laid out ?]. I said to Ernie Jones, “Here you are, what’s this?”
[Inaudible], try and stop it, he said, and up goes the bloody [?]. Well, this was times when Alan
Tatham was the London man, you know, [?]. He was only a boy then. I mean, they…and then of
course, that stopped, eh… Of course, too, we tried, we’ve tried… IRIS, for instance, [inaudible],
you see, but as far as UCATT is concerned, [inaudible], because I suppose they look at it and
they say, oh, it’s all AEU. Now, there’s things that UCATT would [?], you see, so I mean, it’s
eh…somewhere in the history, in that history, just [?], not the old ones. In the previous history,
it’s a bound copy, about that thick – you’ve got that, haven’t you?
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Yes.
Well, that is more use to you as a…to know what was ticking in the union than this. This, of
course, is eh…is more sophisticated because, underlying that, you can tell – for instance, I think it
was Wolsencroft that said, “Oh, no, no, no, no, no, we can’t let them have the…have a standing
orders committee, and we can’t have people coming here briefed – they’ll be factioneering next,
and that’s it!” Well, all Wolsencroft said that for was because he didn’t have a very strong [action,
you see], and, you see, now, we haven’t got a very strong [action], because, you see, you try, but
I [?] – all I trade on is, the factions [I try and help], is that, well, look, let’s try and do the best for
the organisation. [?], you see, and whilst they…they all…quite a lot of them come and ask me
when problems arise, you know – what can we do about this, that and the other, I can only advise
them in accordance with the law, you see. Smithy, for instance, George Smith, gives me “God
bless you, Jack, and more power to the elbow,” but George Smith never helps me. I’m practically
certain that the CPO get more help from that office than I do. I don’t say they get it from George
Smith, but they get it from within the office, you see, because eh…I can meet people on the 20th
of December, and the 21st was the final day of voting, you see. [?] couldn’t possibly be out [on
the 22nd], but on the…I [could] meet the man, met the man on [?], Kelly’s won. Well, [inaudible].
I says, “Alright, [bet you a fiver] that Charlie Kelly is there.” You know more than me then
[laughing]! Well, he come and told me. Well, now, it’s obvious to me that somebody had let that
drop for that fellow to know, you see, whereas, I could not tell, up until January. I spoke to
George Smith because I met him socially. I said, “How’s things going, George?” “Oh, very tight,”
he says, “very tight.”
Well now, so, you see, this…this is why it makes me all the more bitter, if that’s the word to use,
to keep on trying to build up the factions, because, you see, unless you do get reasonable people
in there that will… You see, I’ve got the most reasonable in there in [Les Wood]. Oh, [Les
Wood], and [?] young fellow, you know, and [?]. You know, to do a job like that, you’ve got to
have a bit of…at times, you’ve got to have a bit of guts, and if you want to help your friends,
you’ve got to have [your bid] in there, but it’s no good your friends coming to you if in there is
[Gerry] – “I would if I could, but I can’t!” you know. [?]. So you’ve got to get someone in there
that’s… And the reason that, eh, at the moment, you see, we’re well and truly in the [storm],
because of the [?] that’s on our side, supposed to be on our side, one of them, when it suits him,
will play [?], and that’s [a Welshman], I’m sorry to say, [?], you see, because why? Because
[inaudible]. He’s been put on the em…the educational side, the health, health education, [?] in
Geneva. He spends a couple of months there every year. Now, then, if he…goes and bucks the
others too much, they can turn round and say, “Hey, the CC takes precedence over that – you
can’t go, you’ll have to come back,” you’ll have to do this, you’ll have to do that, you see, and
eh… Of course, he could stand up to them if they had the core, but they haven’t got them, you
see, and because you can never tell.
You see, there’s an injustice going on at the present time that eh is totally wrong. You see, 10
years, I was [?], and every year, I went up for election, so I had to work bloody hard so that
blokes would say, “I might not always agree with old Jack, but he’s a straight-up bloke!” you
know. That’s how, for 10 years, every year, I got in. I [went/ran] on the Executive every year,
every three years. For the best part of about 12 year, I was eh…every three years elected, and
then it was made five years. A couple of years before I retired, I went to election. Jack [Russell]
was going up against me. But we’ve got a man on the Executive now, you see, that came on
straight from the shop – Arthur Utting got on the Executive. He should come up for election this
year, September, December time, but, in November, he’s 60, so the rule says, after 60, no more
elections, so he’s going to get 10 years for one election, you see, and yet the same [?] create
hell, say, “Oh, the elections, we want elections – the more of them, the better!” you see, and yet
here’s the man that’s absolutely…every word he says, he gets from inspiration from the Party,
because, otherwise, he hasn’t got [any]. You see, Smith [inaudible] it’s all about. That’s not the
point – he’s there! But when it comes to it, and somebody puts up something that’s, you know,
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
not quite cricket, if it meets with the Party line, Arthur’s hand goes up, you see. This is what’s
eh…is bad.
In the old Woodworkers, we eh, we always sort of, you’ve got it, took the middle road. For
instance, if you read back in history, the first year I went on the Executive [laughing], first Labour
Party Conference [I had], [?], on the idea of changed circumstances [?]. [?] said, “I agree.” So,
we put it to the delegation and said, look, you’re the people who decide – we contend that the
Conference resolution last year saying that we should oppose German rearmament is not
applicable at the present time, circumstances have changed, and the delegation, with [?] against,
carried. That was my first year on the Executive, you see, so, I mean, I’ve seen it that, you know,
that gripes in here, you think to yourself, I don’t know, you try and do this, you try and do that, but
after all is said and done, time has proved, [when it’s said and done], we did the right thing, but I
mean, if you look at that little pamphlet, you will see that em…we certainly eh… I’m not saying
that we couldn’t have perhaps done better, but I’m going to say this: we’d have done a lot – we’d
have done better at a lot greater sacrifice [among the blokes], because that little [?], in the main,
was without sacrifice. I mean, the next [inaudible], gets up and he says, “What do you think of
that, another man censoring justice?” he said. [?] “[?] give you a smack across the mouth?! Oh,
we ain’t having this! This is Hitler!” He don’t think more than that [?], [?] extreme case, [?]. But
when you say to the bloke, but here, he [threatened you], after he’d called him [?] his name, said
his mother and father wasn’t married or something [laughing], but, oh, oh, didn’t know that…you
see. But eh, I mean, you say, you’ll never stop them, or blokes jumping up and saying you can
get another 15 bob out of this job if we…if we work our cards right, you know, and eh, at the end
of the week, somebody says, “Eh, where’s our [extra three bob]?” and he says, “Oh well, we’ve
been to a panel and they told us to go back to work.”
You see, you’ll never stop that, but I’m saying that those, that progress there, and I did a study
once, and if you do it, you’ll find I’m correct. I used to look after [Camden]. Now, [?], we used to
follow the building trade workers, and the conditions of the [?] [upped] the building trade rate
because my carpenters was in [?]. Well, we had a cost of living [?] for years, [?].
This was like a sliding scale?
That’s right. Now then, the AEU was to direct the negotiations, till it come to the end of the [?],
and [?], the bloke says, “What’s your rate now?” because it never showed up – all it said in the
agreement, carpenters, “as per building trade rates”, BTR. [He said], “Hey, but what’s that?” “Ah,
you know, here, it’s like London and Liverpool.” Well, of course, sometimes, [I had to tell them],
you see. I said, well, [?], year after year, and the building trade rate, if I remember, [?] 20 years,
had stood our chaps in good stead, and that they had gone…improving all the time, whereas the
AEU was keeping on a much lower [hand]. And eh, so when they wanted us to go on, for a long
time, I resisted it, and [?]. That’s why I had to do this exercise, because I was [?] research. And I
went into this EC meeting and said, “Hey, there you are – have a look at this!” Of course, they
looked, oh…”Ah yeah, but in the interest of unity…” Well, in the interests of unity, in the end, we
accepted that it would be direct negotiations and we didn’t follow the [?], but it’s proved – what I’m
trying to point out to you, that that little yellow book has proved that, taking industry in general,
that the building industry didn’t do so bad. Of course, you can point out, and [?], for instance, the
likes of [Ford’s] here, because of the industry it is, that chaps were always getting a lot more than
our chaps, you see, craftsmen, you see. Craftsmen were going in there driving cranes, because
they were getting more money and it was regular…regular – but, they had to keep their nose
down, at times.
But I suppose the problem with money was really the difference between like what people were
getting under the piece-rate and then what they were getting sort of as a result of national
negotiation on the sliding scale…
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Well, of course, the eh…from ’47, I would say to…to ’60, nearly ’60, all these [?]. Well, for
instance, in the eh…[?], used to get thruppence an hour bonus for conscientious working. Well,
what happened? Many of the [?] did go on for a few months, and then the employer or the shopfitters, their association, would meet our people and say, “Ti-ti-ti-ti, look here, this thruppence, the
production is…look here…” and they’re all showing you bloody graphs and how their production
has gone…! Leave it with us. Very strong-worded statement. [What would happen is], the
officials [?], look, get out – look, if you don’t want to lose that thruppence next month, you’ll have
to get, you know, get [?], [?] you know, proving that, you know, get chaps, get them to prove it,
that you’re sitting on your BTMs, you know. Then, the next meeting of the association would be,
“Oh, we appreciate, gentlemen, the trade union side, but eh…[you’re] as good as your word,
production has improved.” Well then, it improved for about another couple of months [laughing],
and he’d you’d do it all over again! He got a regular exercise. But, not until they got down to
eh…proper schemes, you see, did they get to, you know, a bloke was earning his money and…
For instance, bricklayers, that was [physical] and it was [always] – you’d go up the East India
Dock road, a block of flats there, opposite the East India Dock there, was built by McAlpine, that
was one of the dearest bricklaying jobs that ever was, because, in the end, they were…they’re
getting paid so much for so many bricks that it was working out, I think, something about em…20
bricks an hour.
That was before the incentive scheme, was it?
Oh yes. It was when the…it was when the incentive schemes was in their infancy, you see. Of
course, [and whether] he carried it out or not, I [doubt it]. [I remember] McAlpine’s representative
said to me… I said, “Christ Almighty, [?].” “Oh, no,” he said, “we’ve given them an offer – they’re
coming back tomorrow.” I said, oh. [He said], “I’ll tell you one thing,” this is what he said, he said,
“I’ll tell you one thing, [?] is that [?] that in future we shall have to look [to it that] buildings are put
up in reinforced concrete and only carry a minimum of cladding, and the less bricks we can use,
the better.” Well, whether that carried any [?]. I know it wasn’t so long after that that you saw the
buildings going up under this plastic [?], because it was getting farcical, getting farcical.
I mean, I had a case where, in [?], where the chaps were laying a three-inch floor because [?].
They had wooden floors because [?] fixing to it, you see, but they had [?]. [Inaudible – only odd
word discernible]. And I thought to myself, [?], you know. Anyway, [?]. [?], chaps, [?], I just can’t
make a go of it – it’s ridiculous! Till, in the end, and I’ll never forget [?], increased this amount,
which I thought was in line with [?], so I said, “Yeah, I think I can give that a go.” He said, “I’ll tell
you something,” he said, “[they won’t] give a go,” he says, “they’ll bloody shop you and me – don’t
you bother about that, Mr Youngs!” I went back and got the blokes to accept it. Do you know
how they repaid me? Within a week, they was earning treble, treble time – not double time but
treble time, and the bloke, [?], the next time [I met him], I forget the contractor now, the next time I
met him, he said, “Well, Mr Youngs, remember what I told you?” So I said, “Yeah, but you must
be able to afford it, you know, because you’re paying…” He said, “There’s no question of that,”
he said, “we’re just passing it on,” he said [laughing]. He said, eh, you know, [it’s reinstatement],
he said, “But I know,” he said, “because,” he said it’s… You know, he said, “We’ve got an
absolutely marvellous amount of information,” but that, he knew that a fair thing was
just…perhaps just [about] what he’d offered me, because I reckon that, if a chap’s earning double
time, that’s if he’s getting two weeks’ wages, then I would say that’s fair [money], because,
otherwise, otherwise, (a) if either…he’s just killing himself, you see, or he’s fiddled it in the first
instance, you see, because…I mean, I… When I was working at the trade, I’m certain, because I
know [?], but I’m certain I could not, physically, have gone even a quarter [of the time] faster,
couldn’t have done, because, I mean, my – I’ve still got them upstairs, I’m certain, the Ministry of
Works’ lists – have they got it [?]]?
Yeah.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
And, to…I remember this, to put on a Yale lock on a front door was one hour. And do you know
what was entailed in putting on a Yale lock? Just mark the door, drill an inch-and-a-quarter hole
through the door, screw the lock on, fit it. I…when I saw it, I said [?], wouldn’t you, to some of the
other chaps, you know, because eh, I mean, it was extraordinary how good that was. There may
have been some others that might have been a big tight, but, you know, I didn’t find any. But
they…that was the yardstick that the eh…everybody wanted to use, from the employers’ side,
you see, and of course, eh…[?] - instead of being [?], you picked it up like that, and it was just an
ordinary piece of [stuff], straight, you know. All the work was cut out, but blokes still wanted…and
this is where it’s…it’s eh…it’s gone, you know… I think, on some jobs, where they get a
reasonable gang of blokes together, and they find they’ve got a [regular] job, I would say the likes
of Laing’s, McAlpine’s, [Costain’s], they’re a [?] crowd, but if you had any in expansion, you know,
sudden expansion, [?] perhaps, either the quality would suffer or something, if the blokes are
going toBut do you think that’s one of the reasons…I mean, in the ‘60s especially, there was a lot of talk
generally, you know, in technical journals and that, of industrialisation of the building trade. It was
all these pre-fabricated…like you get these pre-fabricated picture rails and that, to be assembled
on-site. Instead of having the people actually on-site doing the work and manufacturing, you
suddenly find you’re getting just…it’s an assembly [process], if you see what I mean.
Ah yes, yes. Taylor Woodrow started a factory out in East Anglia.
Yeah.
But, you see, in the end, it led to a stereotype of building, and, eh, you couldn’t do it on awkward
sites. You see, for instance, if a site was thrown out of square, it made it bloody awkward. Well,
when you’re putting a block up like this, if there’s a…if there’s an angle in the road, you can follow
the building line round on the angle, but you can’t do that if you’ve got square boxes, you see –
you just can’t do it. And eh, I think, in the end, they found out that this was alright in certain
areas, but that it was costly. Because they started this in Russia, but they quickly went back to
traditional building.
Yeah. No, I was looking at that change really in the technology as being like another reason –
because that breaks down demarcation, or at least it goes [the other way]…
That’s true, true.
And it’s another sort of push in that direction of everyone doing the same job, and it’s from that
kind of situation that people start to reason why be in a different organisation, you know…
That’s true, yeah, possibly. Well, of course, the thing was that out in East Anglia, that Taylor
Woodrow’s, I think there were only two organisations in it – that was the ASW and the Transport
& General. You see, now, we pushed the others out – when I say “we” pushed them, the industry
did, because the plumbing was just laying the pipe in, you see, and then when it come to…to
eh…a section where all the plumbing work was done, that was done somewhere else, you see,
so the plumbers said, oh well, this was a nice little [regular corner] for them. They were making
bathroom and toilet sections, you see. But if there was a bit of their trade in the other part of the
building, well, it just went in the…well, anybody put it in, because, I mean, it was… The [?], to go
and see, it was out of this world, you know. You just went along, and the chaps, if they’d got
something, an insert to put in, a sash or a doorframe, they couldn’t but put it in the right place
because there was the slot for it to drop in, you see.
Yeah. I’ve seen some pictures of these brick walls where, instead of getting one brick, you’d get
a whole section, you know, a group of groups and just slot them in.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
Mm, that’s right, that’s right.
Amazing technique… Coming back to the T&G actually, because I wanted to ask you a bit more
about that, with the…I suppose, breakdown of changing technology, the T&GW, I get the
impression they…they always recruited the labourers, and I get the impression they started to
look at the craftsmen. I looked at the building trade union memberships, and they’re all going
down in the ‘60s. The T&G building trades group are also losing membership, and I wonder did
they start to look at perhaps the ASW, and certainly the bricklayers, and they say, oh well, you
know, we’ll start to move into that area. Was that really a serious threat before they got the
plasterers or was it…?
No. Before the plasterers went in, we had an agreement, via the Federation. If you look in the
old Federation rule books, you’ll find it there, saying that no poaching from other people’s work,
see, and as far as the T&G and the General Municipal were concerned, they represented
labourers only. If you look in the Federation, you’ll find that.
Well, when they took in Albert Dunn’s lot, the Plasterers, of course that made us…[?], you see,
but it wasn’t long before…quite a number of the plasterers, and plumbers for instance, was
coming into UCATT, not as plumbers and plasterers – now, I must correct any wrong impression.
We agreed, at national level anyway, that we would not organise plasterers. We told the T&G
that, look, alright, you’re organising plasterers, that’s up to you, but what they were doing, they
were coming in to us as building trades section, and, you see, the building trade section, you’d
say to a bloke, “Well, what are you?” “Oh, building trade section.” But if you poked him a bit, “But
what are you really?” “Oh, well, I was [recently] a slater and tiler,” you know, “I was a plasterer.”
Oh… Well, we had some of that, but it wasn’t intentionally done.
But I think, then, we had a bit of a ding-dong because, in local authorities, and they haven’t got
over this yet, in local authorities, the T&G, where they’ve got, you know, most of the [?], they were
trying to take in the craftsmen, but that was defeated because, you see, you had NUPE coming
in, arguing the toss, and saying, to beat the T&G, were saying, “Hey, ASW, the T&G have got
some carpenters on Devon Council,” you see.
And then we…there was discussions with the General Municipal, because they were the people, I
would have thought, that possibly they might have been [the union], [?] UCATT got [?]. I don’t
know, because different people [?]. But we had some very nice talks with them. They acted –
got to give them credit – they acted absolutely gentlemanly. When we had a go at them about,
look here, it’s come to our notice, in some of your areas, you’re organising, we’ve got [?]
negotiating, talking about it, we got them to agree that any of our sections who’d gone into the
General Municipal over the last, oh, I forget now, it was two or three years, that they would return,
providing we respected those people who had been with them for a number of years and claimed
some allegiance to the General Municipal. We bloody quickly got that, so that’s why I call them
[gentlemen]. But…
No, I was really seeing the T&G more as, well, a threat really. Going through your NEC minutes,
March 1966, I find George Smith writing to Jack Jones and saying…it’s the first time we’ve ever
had a problem with the T&G – suddenly you’re interested in our craftsmen, and he’s having to
prepare a special letter to go to Jack Jones about the problem. That’s ’66. Then they get the
Plasterers, what, ’68?
Mm.
And then they, the T&G establish, from that, a craftsmen’s section, of their building trade group.
Well, it seemed to me like they were gradually trying to move in. I mean, that’s a sort of…maybe
just a foot in the door, but…
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
They were trying. They were trying.
It must certainly have been at the back of your mind in thinking about amalgamation… I mean,
you went to the, you know, the various meetings…
We never, we never, never gave any thought to the T&G. Since I’ve left, they’ve [no thought] to
the T&G, but George had private conversations with Jack Jones [when he was at the TUC], which
led to an exchange of letters, and the questions had to be asked: what’s all this bloody rumour
about talks going on with the T&G? You see, because, there were people in the T&G that knew
of it, [?], and it gave them the greatest pleasure to say, “Oh, there’s talks going on…!” [laughing]
and George was faced up with it, and then they sent… There was supposed to be a delegation
to go and meet Jack Jones, you see – this was [from] two or three years ago, and eh, you know
what he did, [?]? “Oh yes, oh yes, [?].” In their own mind, they think [to theirselves, you know,
I’m] dodging that one.
Yeah.
Well, of course, it so happened that the only two that went along was, eh, Bert Wilkinson, the
Geordie fellow, and George Smith. Well, Bert’s a funny fellow, eh, very [?]…and of course, one
of the last things, once he rumbled people was sort of treating him as the boy, he didn’t like it, you
see, well…[but] it took him a long while to rumble it – you know, you [?]. You could go ninetenths of a mile before Bert would realise, you know, that you was eh…politely, but quietly,
leaving him to play with his…papers. Anyway, he went there, and George had said, “Well, we’ll
agree a statement.” Bert turned round and said, “Half a minute, we’re agreeing no statement!
Look here, brother Jones, we have come here to tell you that we have no thoughts whatsoever of
any amalgamation or transfer of engagements. What we are prepared to do is to have
reasonable working arrangements.” George [switched] it round and said, “Well, that’s what I
mean, Bert!” Hence you will now see, as you have done for the last couple of years, an
endeavour has been made to get spheres of influence agreed. NowThis is all since the formation of UCATT, isn’t it?
Oh yes, yes, yes, because I met the man who’s supposed to be the cause of all the trouble. He
said, “Why is it..?” He said, “Here, Jack,” [I remember him saying], he said, “And I took notice of
it, and I’ve tried ever since,” he said, “but George takes a delight, whenever he sees me,” he said,
“in accusing me of some diabolic things!” That’s young George [Henderson]. So, I said, “Oh well,
of course, you should know George by now – you should know George Smith by now.” So he
said, “Yeah.” I said, “Now, look, how far [?],” at that time. He said, “Well, he’s talking about it
now, but,” he said, “he only talks about it after he’s insulted me up to my eyes and told me what
I’ve done,” he said, “and then he said, “We’ve got to get down to it.”” He said, “Well, after all is
said and done, Jack, you wouldn’t get down to it, would you?” Now, being honest, he said, “I
know what you told me that time,” he said, “and I respect you for it,” he said, “but you wouldn’t do
it if people…” I said, “Well, look, there’s one thing you’ve got to remember, George, is George is
one of the type and [you’ve got to take no notice of him],” because, after all is said and done, you
know what I’m talking about, it grieved me last week when I went over and we had an office [?]
there, [inaudible]. But he left, [?], and then they put this [inaudible]. “She’s leaving this week –
she can’t stand it.” [?], poor girl, he said, “I’ve seen [?].” She said, “I’ve seen them in tears.” I
said, “The best thing to do is to get out then.” I said, “If it gets you that way, mate,” I said, “and
you’re trying to do your best, get out – tell them, stick it!” But you see, that’s George, and this has
been George since… Sometimes, he’s done some daft things [like that].
For instance, I don’t know if you ever noticed that, some years ago, in Dick Coppock’s time, we
used to be on the IBWW, International Building & Woodworkers’ Federation, and we used to go
and I think they were doing a good job of work and there were some real, decent masons –
Scandinavians and [?]. But Dick Coppock was the shining light and they made him President
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
for…evermore, you know, and when he was too old to do the job like, see, he was still President
but there was another man in the place, you see. So, old Dick always sat on the platform, but at
the end, like, you know, Dick was still there, [?] you see. And of course, [?] bloody value for
money here, well, he [?], and of course, there comes to a time when you’ve got to say, well, let’s
look at it for what it is, and, oh yes, true enough, there’s asking, [?] asking for increasing
[remuneration] fees, and they was squandering a lot of money in [?], and we were getting
information coming back they were buying typewriters, and the next month, there was another
typewriter because the other one had been flogged or had been… Buying bikes for trade union
officials, [?], and eh, the next thing is he had to have another bike and the old bikes was being
sold to all the… So, it was an American chap that they employed to go and find out because [?].
So, of course, we said, oh, [?] and we’re not paying anymore. So, he went [?], not playing this
information, you see, and this is where their decency [?]. They said, [“We understand] – stop with
us, pay the affiliation fees that you now pay.” Well, mad dogs and Englishmen…! “Well, we want
no charity from nobody – ho-ho-ho!” We pulled out, see.
Yeah.
Of course, pulled out was Harry Weaver, was Jim Mills…not old Dick because old Dick was there
until he [?], and the next thing is that, eh, well, [?] committee to discuss [?]. “Oh yes, eh, oh, we
want a couple of us to go to – I’ll go over and explore it.” George went over, and George came
back, and said, well, I want a committee, a committee of two, to look in the possibilities of what
the Common Market was going to have an effect on the…the national, you see. Oh yes, let’s
report. Go and report, George [?], again, you see, and the next thing is, before you know where
you are…”What’s going on here?!” Oh, well…alright, you’d better send another one – should
have been two in the first place, {?], you see. [?] under, oh yes, well… Put the blunt question,
“Hey, are you getting involved with the International again?” Oh no… It so happens we met the
Secretary fellow, you see, and to cut a long story short, before very long, there’s interchange of
delegates, just as I retired, an interchange of delegates just for old time’s sake. They’re now back
in the International Federation of Building and Woodworkers, and George is on the Executive, eh,
Glyn is the…something else, and eh…and the affiliation fees are being paid the same as
everybody else. So, you see, it’s not always that things are done in the best interest, but there’s
not a lot you can do to eh…to stop it, you see.
Yeah.
The same as there’s some…some awful things go on at the TUC at times, you see, because
they’ve got to bend to try and suit someone, you see. Now, it would appear to me that, over the
last two or three years, they’ve got Jack Jones and [?] in, they’ve got old em…my old friend,
Hughie Scanlon, which, if you handled him the right way, mate, Hughie Scanlon was [alright].
They got him seeing the right way. Got eh…young Moss, chap I’ve worked with for donkey’s
years, young Moss Evans…
He was Vehicle Builders, wasn’t he?
No, no, not Moss. You’re thinking of eh…mm…oh, you’re thinking of the other
fellow…Glen…Glen…Glen something, the automobile section.
Yeah.
But no, young Moss came from, eh, originally from, oh, he come from the Midlands, [?] Midlands.
Now, he’s gone in there and he’s going to do a Jack Jones, Frank Cousins, for the first couple of
years. It’s just like the old [guerrillas/gorillas] and eh, we’re going to have it all over again, see.
So…it’s, you know, it’s…I don’t know, sometimes, I think to myself oh…especially when I don’t
feel up to it, you know, they’re like [?], [?] messages to send out, I think to myself, ah, turn it in,
Jack.
Interviewed c.1978 by Janet Druker, then a PhD student at the University of Warwick
Interview – Jack Youngs
Transcribed by Alison McPherson, alison.mcpherson@premiertyping.com, www.premiertyping.com
One of the things I…coming back to this T&G business and what you were talking about earlier
on with the Communist Party, it intrigues me because the Communist Party, they get perhaps a
line on something, you know. They’ve got some people going into UCATT, and then they’ve got
some people going into the T&G, and I know you’ve got the demarcation agreement, but there
are areas, I don’t know, say blokes who work on wood-shuttering or something, concrete, where I
would have thought they could go into one or the other. I wonder…have they got a choice? I
mean, do they prefer you to the T&G or the other way round?
All shuttering, all shuttering should be the work of carpenters.
Yeah. Yeah, but there’s some blokes in the T&G, aren’t there?
Yes, of course there is, and they do some steel shuttering, which eh…they say, well, it’s akin to
[?] work, but…
Yeah. No, I just wondered if the Party, in that situation, had a line on where, you know, in a
sense, where their members should be going, whether there was…
Well, no, I don’t think so, because, you see, look at em… [This fellow] is a terrible
embarrassment to the T&G at the moment, but it’s Cassidy that was up the crane.
Oh, he sat up there…
Yes, remember the chap who sat up the crane, caused a hell of a…
Yeah.
And of course, it was then proclaimed he was a member of the Communist Party and [?]. Well,
he [come down from the crane], and then he used [his loaf], and they had to accept him as…an
organiser, so he’s a full-time official. The next thing is, well, London - then he’s a power on the
throne in London, for the construction industry. Lesley Kemp, he’s gone, he’s gone to eh…the
[Training Board and] a couple of other…em…couple of other New Town corporations, which,
again, you see, different [?]. New Town corporation, Les Kemp, [?], Peterborough or somewhere.
There was another one, up in Northampton… Chairmanship of the Construction Industry Training
Board – Les Kemp. [?]. “Jack, what do you think of the chairmanship of [?].” So there was only
[?], because I was…I…I was on the start of the Construction Industry Training Board, so [?]
Training Board, and we had [?]. And I must say that I made some very nice acquaintances, both
on the academic side and the…employers’ side. Equally, there were some rotten old swines on
the employers’ side and some silly buggers on the [other] side. [Inaudible]. So, [he said], “Well,
what about UCATT?” I said, ”But George, he’s been the Vice-Chairman for bloody years!” and he
had, and he’d been Chairman of the Civil Engineering Committee, eh, this place out in Norfolk,
see, but eh, you know, the bloke had done some pretty good work. I know because he used to
seek my support on certain projects, you see, and the bloke was working hard, and he never
worked against UCATT, because if I had – [they] didn’t have anything, and I said to him [?]. He
wouldn’t do it. [?]. [He] said, “Oh, I was going to put your name up.” I said, “Well, don’t waste
your time, [George],” and then he went to [?]. Well, of course, he didn’t get much joy there, so he
went, [?], to Jack Jones, and he had to[End of recording]