Oldham Trades Union Council: 1867 – 2007 

A summary history on our 140^th anniversary

1867

Oldham Trades Council was registered for the first time – one of the first in the country. One of its first acts was to organise an Oldham United Trades demonstration to protest against a legal ruling that reinforced trade unions’ illegality. Faced with this, individual unions were too weak to fight alone, hence the need for Trades Councils. The rally at Oldham Edge was attended by 6,000 people, and was addressed by the Chartist Ernest Jones.

1872

The Criminal Law Amendment Act legalised unions, but still enabled the prosecution of strike leaders. A 1,000 strong rally at Spinners Gardens protested, and also demanded a 54-hour week.

1875

The anti-strike legislation was repealed. Up to this time, the Trades Council consisted of cotton industry unions and skilled engineering trades. Miners and semi/unskilled workers were not affiliated.

1883-1893

Large increase in affiliated membership from 5,785 to 29,226. This was the result of a deep economic recession, during which a more politically active “new union” movement came to rival the more traditional craft-based unions. Oldham TC was directly involved in pay negotiations for transport workers and the joiners union.

1890

First female Executive member was Mary Callaghan, President of the Weavers Union. She served until 1896 when her own union saw fit to replace her. No more women were elected to the Executive until individual places were introduced in 1918. Suffragette Annie Kenny attended delegate meetings, but did not serve on the Executive.

1893

29^th July 1893 was a real red-letter day in the history of Oldham Trades Council. Andrew Bennett – author of the Centenary History – described the events as follows:

On July 29^th 1893, the TC held a demonstration in favour of the “eight hour movement”. It was a fine demonstration of the strength that the Labour movement in Oldham had by then attained. The Standard estimated that 20,000 people walked in the procession, which stretched 5 miles through the streets of Oldham. Many more watched and the Police had to have help of Firemen and Lamplighters in controlling the crowds.

A new banner was commissioned for the occasion (this is the one which was recently restored and displayed at Gallery Oldham), and the route incorporated the length of Union Street, Yorkshire Street and back up to the Oldham Rifle Volunteer Drill Field off Henshaw Street. The rally was addressed by Keir Hardie and Tom Mann. The size of the demonstration is amazing considering it came after the cotton lock-outs of 1892-3, which severely weakened the cotton unions. Even more amazingly, the leadership of the Cotton Spinners Union were not in favour of the eight hour campaign – clearly the rank and file were not impressed by this! Internal political divisions meant agreement could not be reached for another large rally in 1894.

1895

Oldham TC’s secretary was JR Clynes, who went on to become Home Secretary in the Labour government of 1929-31.

1898

Oldham Trades Council became Oldham Trades and Labour Council. The name change represented the victory of the “new unionism” – led by Clynes and his colleagues in the Independent Labour Party – over the traditional model embodied in the Cotton Spinners union. The traditionalists had backed indirect representation in politics by backing Liberal and Tory candidates in elections, but this had not delivered for working people – pay and conditions actually went worse during economic downturns – so the argument for direct representation through the fledgling Labour Party eventually won the day. Unfortunately the short term result was a mass exodus from the Trades Council in 1895, led by the Cotton Spinners, which saw membership drop from the high of 29,226 in 1892 to 5,570 in 1899.

1899

The disaffiliated unions chose to sponsor a Conservative candidate at the 1899 general election, but defeat saw the end of this approach. Even more telling was the Taff Vale judgement, where it was ruled that employers could sue unions for losses caused by strikes. Such was the national outcry against this attack on the movement, that the joint campaigning locally brought the unions back into harmony. By 1902 membership of the TLC was back up to. 23,923.

1904

TLC sponsors Labour candidates for Parliament and local elections.

1906

Prospective Parliamentary candidate Thomas Ashton withdrew from the general election at the last minute because his union (the Cotton Spinners) would not agree to release him from his full-time job in the union. The Liberals had agreed to stand aside, so a golden opportunity to elect the first Oldham Labour MP was lost. Some consolation was derived from JR Clynes election as MP for NE Manchester.

1910

First Labour local councillor elected with TLC support. TLC membership reached 33,824.

1911

A separate Oldham Labour Party was now in existence, and jointly supported a candidate at a Parliamentary by-election with the United Textile Workers Association and the TLC. A Liberal candidate split the radical vote, and the vote was lost.

1914

Increasing industrial unrest drove the TLC to merge with the Labour Party. Isaac Crabtree was appointed Secretary and Agent of the combined body.

1914-18

The TLC did not campaign against the war, but fought against conscription of men. The TLC argued instead for the “conscription of wealth”, i.e. nationalisation to ease the burden caused by the rise in the cost of living. In 1916 the TLC donated an ambulance to the army.

1918

TLC allowed individuals to stand for election to its Executive. This increased the participation of women. At the general election, Vice President James Bell was elected MP for Ormskirk. 

1921

Local miners locked out. TLC raises £528 14s 8d in support (£30,000 at today’s prices).

1923

A May Day rally was organised as part of the TUC’s “Back to the Union” campaign. The rally became an annual event.

1922

WJ Tout was elected Labour MP for Oldham. Meanwhile JR Clynes had become leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party, but was deposed by Ramsey Macdonald who became Prime Minister in 1923. Clynes had to be satisfied with being Leader of the House of Commons.

1924

WJ Tout was defeated with the Labour government at the general election. The TLC had sponsored 6 sitting councillors, but there was now competition from a faction which supported the Communist Party as an alternative to Labour.

1926

The General Strike. TLC does door-to-door collections and raises £1,082 19s 1 1/2d for the miners families (£50,000 at today’s prices).

1927

Tory anti-union legislation forced the separation of the TLC into industrial and political sections. In practice the two sections continued to operate as one. Membership was expanding, and women’s and youth sections were created.

Arnold Tweedale was appointed “Clerk to the Council” to shadow Isaac Crabtree as he approached retirement, and went on to be the longest-serving secretary.

1929

Gordon Lang elected second Labour MP in election which brought a Labour government in coalition with Liberals.

1931

Disastrous collapse of Labour Government after failing to implement policies favouring workers caused mass defections from the local Labour Party and TLC. Clynes resigned from cabinet in protest at cut in employment benefits. Lang was not considered worthy of TLC support at next election.

1932-9

After the great depression, political and trade union activity stepped up. The political section of the TLC increasingly transferred responsibility to ward parties, and union mergers meant affiliates were more likely to look to their better-resourced national organisations for help with industrial campaigns. In this period, the TLC lost much of its power and influence, and became essentially a symbolic organisation.

1945-67

The TLC found itself niche roles by maintaining the May Day Committee, and formed an Oldham Tenants Defence Association in 1954. A trade union recruitment drive in 1956 produced over 1,000 new members, and USDAW gave thanks for the TLC’s assistance in gaining a recognition agreement with Greenwoods Tailors in 1957.

1967

Andrew Bennett wrote Oldham Trades & Labour Council Centenary 1867-1967, which is the source for most of this 140^th anniversary summary.

2001

National Front and British National Party stirred up racial hatred on the streets of Oldham. Race riots created national headlines as Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage youths bombarded the Police who had failed to protect them from fascist incursions.

2002

Oldham Trades Union Council re-launched to help counter the fascist threat. Imra Shoaib elected the first ever female Muslim President in the country.

Oldham TUC jointly organised a march and rally in protest at a spate of violent attacks on Oldham taxi drivers.

2005

Secretary Martin Gleeson arrested for damaging a wreath placed by the BNP at the Holocaust Memorial Day ceremony. Massive support nationally and internationally forced the charges to be dropped.

2007

Partnership with Oldham United Against Racism in an independent third party campaign prevented election of BNP candidates at all local elections since 2002.

Compiled by Martin Gleeson

Oldham Trades Union Council Secretary 2002-7

December 2007

Oldham Trades Council in the General Strike of 1926

By Martin Gleeson

2007 is the 140^th anniversary of the founding of Oldham Trades Union Council (or the 150^th if you take a literal reading from the Trades Council banner which was on display recently at Gallery Oldham). As the incumbent secretary of our venerable organisation, I thought it was an appropriate time to take a look into the archives to see what our predecessors got up to many years ago.

This article is not an attempt at a history of the Trades Council – Andrew Bennett’s excellent Centenary Handbook from 1967 remains the definitive publication – but I chose to delve into the archive material deposited by Andrew Bennett himself and the 1967 secretary in the Oldham Local History Library archive to get a flavour of trade unionism in Oldham from the distant past.

The trade union index at the library includes an “Oldham Trades and Labour Council” section, and also records from various unions and friendly societies spanning the period from the 1880’s up until the 1980’s. As you would expect, these are dominated by the textile unions, but there are also records from the Oldham and District Engineers’ Society, and Oldham NUT records from 1929 to 1981. There is even a section on the Oldham Master Cloggers Society, which ran from 1895 to 1961 and had over 100 members at its peak!

The Trades Council section consists of minutes of delegate and executive meetings, Industrial Section and Fair Contracts sub-committees, accounts and annual reports. The documents span 1883 until 1967, so I chose to take a snapshot around the time of the general strike of 1926 to delve a little closer into the workings of the Trades Council at that time of crisis for the working class.

I selected two items for detailed study: secretary Isaac Crabtree’s minute book, covering the years 1924 to 1927; and the journal “Oldham Labour Gazette” which was published from 1923 until 1940.

In the years leading up to the general strike, the Trades and Labour Council held delegate meetings at either the Weaver’s Institute, Bartlam Place (off Horsedge Street – sometimes referred to as the Temperance Hall) or at the AEU Club, Peter Street. Executive meetings were usually held at the Trades Council’s own office at 151 Union Street (this building is still standing).

Glancing through the minute book for 1925, I observed that Isaac Crabtree recorded the election of the Executive Committee, which comprised four reserved places for the textile unions, three each for the iron trades and general trades, one each for building, transport, labour organisations and two individuals (which commendably required a gender balance).

The Trades Council organised an annual Mayday march and rally at this time, and the theme for 1925 was “a living wage for all men and women workers, and the right to live a decent life”. The procession assembled at Mumps, and marched up Union Street culminating in a “large demonstration” at the Park Gates. The numbers participating are not recorded, but the minutes express the Committee’s satisfaction with the turnout.

Another item caught my eye from later in 1925, when a resolution was passed as follows: “That this meeting of the Oldham Trades and Labour Council protest against the action of the Director of Public Prosecutions in reducing the charge of larceny to one of “Breach of Peace” against four members of the National Fascist Movement.” The resolution originated from the Westwood AEU number 15 branch (seconded by number 12 branch), and related to the armed holding up and robbery of a Daily Herald van – The Herald being the mass circulation newspaper of the working class at that time. This worthy motion was controversial, however, with opposition from the floor arguing for stronger action by means of a public meeting to debate the issue. This was defeated, and the secretary was instructed to write protest letters to the Home Secretary and Prime Minister. Reading between the lines, the background to the controversy was likely to have been a power struggle within the Trades and Labour Council between Labour party and Communist delegates. There are several items in the minutes around this time where proposals for allowing Communist involvement in Labour Party structures were batted back by the Executive.

Moving forward to 1926, and the Trades Council was busy organising its next Mayday event with the theme of encouraging women to join unions. However, as May approached the miner’s crisis loomed larger. As we know, Oldham was first and foremost a textile town, with significant engineering industry but only a small coal mining presence. It appears that the two Miners Federation branches did not help their cause by failing to participate fully in the Trades Council. The minutes record their belated attempt to gain a permanent seat on the Executive Committee - a request which was coolly received and rejected until the following year’s AGM.

Nevertheless, the Trades Council took the general strike seriously, calling a number of special Executive Committee meetings to plan support for the miners themselves, and the transport workers who came out in support. At the special meeting of May 7^th (two days before the strike started), arrangements were made to report any movements of textile goods by blackleg labour. The other activity was to initiate a local distress fund – with a suggestion of 3d per day worked in a week as a donation. £27 18s 6d was raised quickly from affiliated branches and individuals.

At the meeting on May 24^th (when the TUC had called off the action, leaving the miners isolated) it was decided to protest to the North Western Road Car Company about the victimisation of fourteen T&G members from the Oldham section. After negotiations, some of the men were offered reinstatement, but others remained sacked.

With the general strike having collapsed but the miners sticking it out alone, the special meeting on June 10^th discussed stepping up fundraising for the miners families. Isaac Crabtree proposed doing a weekly house-to-house collection to boost the funds, and this was accepted. This did not go smoothly to begin with, however. Firstly, the Council’s Watch Committee had to give permission for the house-to-house collections, and in doing so imposed a condition that 50% of the proceeds had to be handed over to the Mayor’s Local Distress Fund. At the meeting on July 6^th, Crabtree complained about the poor response from volunteers to do the collections. The collections continued until the end of the year, when the miners were finally forced to concede and return to work on longer hours and lower pay.

The Oldham Labour Gazette was a four-page broadsheet newspaper, “Issued by Oldham Trades and Labour Council” with its first issue in June 1923 and claiming a circulation of 5,000. Judging from the content, it looks like the Labour Gazette was probably edited by the regional Labour Party with input and financial backing from the Co-operative movement. Most of the articles were not specific to Oldham, but over time the local content increased – something like the Searchlight tabloid specials we have used in our recent election campaigns.

The 1926 issues gave prominent coverage to the miners’ crisis and the progress of the Oldham miners’ family relief fund. All donations were listed, and about 60% came from union branches and organisations (including collections taken at churches and at Oldham Coliseum performances). The remainder came from the house-to-house collections, and each individual contribution was recorded and broken down by Council ward. In the December issue, the whole of the centre pages was taken up with the final list of contributions when the fund was wound up. The final total raised was £1,082 19s 1 1/2d (equivalent to £50,000 at today’s prices). Isaac Crabtree pointed out that a portion of the money had gone to the Mayor’s Fund, and the rest had gone to the Lancashire and Cheshire Miners Federation and some had been advanced to the local miners families directly after an appeal that the funds were not being dispensed quickly enough. There were other ad hoc collections outside of the fund for which figures were not recorded.

Normality then returned to Oldham Trades and Labour Council, and the Oldham Labour Gazette continued on in an unchanged format until September 1940 when we presume wartime conditions and restrictions on materials forced its closure.

When the miners’ relief fund was established, and a slow response to the house to house collections was a cause for concern, it was noted that the fund was re-titled as “for the relief of miners’ wives and children” rather than for the miners directly. Presumably this move was instrumental in boosting the sluggish response, and might seem a slightly cynical move to prick the consciences of donors. However, a final glance at the May 1926 Gazette as I was boxing them up at the end of my session at the Library revealed a small story tucked away on a middle page with no great fanfare.

Under the headline: “Boys killed in the coal mines” the article read:

“During the year 1925 the number of boys under the age of 16 who were killed in the coal mines was 79. The number of boys who were disabled was 15,241. One boy out of every four employed in the mines was injured during the year.”

This stark reminder of the conditions under which millions of working people lived and died in this country puts into perspective the relatively easy lives all of us have nowadays. We salute the efforts of Oldham Trades and Labour Council for their efforts in supporting the miners and their families through their crisis, and of course to the families themselves for the bravery they showed in challenging the capitalist class. Something for which they received little benefit in their own lifetimes, but which was instrumental in the advances in working conditions which came after the war, and from which we all benefit today.

Martin Gleeson

Secretary

Oldham Trades Union Council

August 2007

 Oldham TUC Banner on display

The original Oldham Trades Union Council banner - first seen on the streets of Oldham in 1867 - has been restored by Gallery Oldham, and was on display in July 2007 in an exhibition in the Gallery called Following the Banner.

There were three other trade union banners from textile unions, plus suffragette and religious organisation's banners.

Oldham TUC President Imra Shoaib was recruited to give a talk to school students during the half term week on the history of the banners.

Gallery Oldham has kindly allowed us to use the images below.