The Grunwick dispute was a British industrial dispute involving trade union recognition at the Grunwick Film Processing Laboratories in Chapter Road, Dollis Hill in the London suburb of Willesden, that led to a two-year strike between 1976 and 1978.[1]
During a decade of industrial unrest, the Grunwick dispute became a cause célèbre of trade unionism and labour relations law, and "at its height involved thousands of trade unionists and police in confrontations, ... with over 500 arrests on the picket line and frequent police violence".[2][3][4] The total of 550 arrests made during the strike was at the time the highest such figure in any industrial dispute since the General Strike of 1926.[5] Left-wing journalist Paul Foot described the dispute as "a central battleground between the classes and between the parties".[6]: 1:15 The dispute was reported nightly on the national television news, depicting the often violent clashes between the supporters of the strikers and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group.[7] Grunwick was the first time that this police unit had been deployed in an industrial dispute.[8][9] The mostly female, immigrant, East African Asian strikers – dubbed "strikers in saris" by the news media – were led by Jayaben Desai, whose membership of the union was later suspended[failed verification] following her hunger strike outside the Trades Union Congress (TUC) headquarters in November 1977.[10] This was also the first dispute where the majority of strikers were from an ethnic minority and still received widespread support from the labour movement – previous disputes involving immigrant workers which had taken place in Leicester and Southall had "remained marginalised" and had even led to "open and ugly racism on the part of white union members and their leaders".[11][12][13]
The incumbent Labour government commissioned the Scarman Inquiry, chaired by Lord Scarman, which recommended both union recognition and re-instatement of the workers, but the employer, backed by the right-wing National Association For Freedom (NAFF) and the Conservative Party, rejected the recommendations. The TUC subsequently withdrew their support and the workers' strike committee announced the end of the dispute in June 1978. The repercussions of the strike for British industrial relations were far-reaching, significantly weakening the British trades union movement. The Conservative Party and other members of the right wing saw this as a major political and ideological victory, preparing the ground for Conservative success in the 1979 general election and their subsequent curbing of the unions' power in the 1980s.[8]
^"Grunwick: Chronology of events". University of Leeds. Retrieved 3 September 2010.
^"Your 1970s: Strikes and blackouts". BBC News. 7 June 2007. Retrieved 3 September 2010.
^"Grunwick strike, 1976–1978". Working Class Movement Library. 11 May 2010. Retrieved 3 September 2010.
^James, B.; Simpson, R. C. (September 1978). "Grunwick v. A. C. A. S.". The Modern Law Review. 41 (5): 572. ISSN 0026-7961.
^Brooks, Bill (15 July 1978). "Grunwick strikers call it a day". Morning Star. London.
^Produced/Directed: Deep Sehgal. Narrated: Veronika Hyks (January 2003). "Time Shift: The Grunwick Strike". Time Shift. Season 1. Episode 1. Bristol, England. BBC. BBC Four.
^Travis, Alan (28 December 2007). "Callaghan had Scargill watched as Grunwick dispute escalated". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 4 September 2010.
^ ab"The Grunwick Strike". BBC. 9 March 2010. Retrieved 4 September 2010.
^Bourne, Jenny (23 April 2009). "The political legacy of Blair Peach". Institute of Race Relations. Archived from the original on 27 September 2011. Retrieved 4 September 2010.
^Manzoor, Sarfraz (20 January 2010). "How Asian women made trade union history and shattered stereotypes". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 3 September 2010.
^"The strike at Grunwicks 1976–1978 – 30 years on". Socialist Appeal. 5 September 2007. Archived from the original on 14 July 2011. Retrieved 4 September 2010.
^Mahamdallie, Hassan (4 January 2007). "Muslim working class struggles". International Socialism (113). ISSN 1754-4653. Retrieved 5 September 2010.
^Sivanandan, A. (1977). "Grunwick". Race & Class. 19 (1). Retrieved 6 September 2010. Reprinted at libcom.org.
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