By a blacklisted construction worker (Unite)
This pamphlet does exactly what it says on the tin: demanding a public enquiry, although it is something the establishment are desperate to avoid. Justice for blacklisted construction workers will take a long time. It is nearly ten years since the blacklisting scandal was first exposed. The pamphlet introduction gives an outline of what went on with various organisations keeping tabs on union activists in the building industry, from the Economic League to The Consulting Association which was run by Ian Kerr .
The pamphlet explains how the Consulting Association was finally exposed and how it affected the lives of many building workers. It was found that there were files, including entries such as “DO NOT EMPLOY UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES” and “SHOULD NOT EMPLOY. ACTIVE IN TRADE UNIONS”.
Many individual victims of black-listing are quoted. One worker says “I couldn’t get a job anywhere in London. If I did get a job I’d be off the site in a day or so and never given a valid reason”.
Another said, “it affects your wife and family after a while. You don’t have the money that you should have to be able to afford every ay things like family holidays. I couldn’t have a pint with my mates or take my wife out for a meal on her birthday. We couldn’t go to the pictures. Eventually my wife had three jobs to try an earn money for us to have food on the table. It affected us all and you lose your self-esteem when you can’t provide for your family.”
A number of workers were awarded compensation in 2016. They were forced to settle under what was called a part-36 agreement, where compensation was paid to avoid a court hearing. The claimant was within their rights to refuse the offer. However, if they won the case they would become liable for the defendant’s legal costs should the judge award less compensation than the original part-36 offer. In this way, the guilty party gets all the lawyers’ fees paid by the winning claimant! The legal fees ran into millions and massively exceeded the victims’ potential compensation, so the lawyers advised the claimants to accept the offers rather than face bankruptcy. The trouble was that this allowed the mega-rich companies to buy their way out of a court case.
As Dave Smith argues in the pamphlet, the blacklist cases were never about compensation. Blacklisting is a violation of a person’s human rights. It is not a crime to be a member of a trade union or play an active role.
Blacklisted workers want to see those people responsible for blacklisting them to be held accountable for their actions. Many of the activists who spent years campaigning for justice would probably forgo their compensation to see the directors of the building companies being forced to give evidence in a court of law under oath. They did eventually apologise and Ian Kerr was given a fine of £5000, which was paid by Robert Mcalpine Ltd.
Michael Meacher was spot-on when he said blacklisted workers had been let down by various institutions of the state, the Government, the ICO, the HSE, the police, the political parties and the legal system. It has been acknowledged that blacklisting is a violation of human rights, but because of the way the legal system works, multi-national corporations were able to buy themselves out of a trial and the guilty escaped scot-free. Only a full public enquiry has the potential to uncover the true scale of this national scandal
The blacklist support group are continuing to push for an enquirty, with the help of some labour MPs, including Jeremy Corbyn. We also call for public enquiries on the Shrewsbury pickets, the Orgreave events during the miners’ strike, the Wapping and Grunwick disputes, Camell Laird, to name just a few. Read the full story of blacklisting in the book by Dave Smith and Phil Chamberlain. Blacklisted was a one-sided secret war between big business and union activists. Both the pamphlet and the book are excellent reads.
Get the pamphlet from: http://www.ier.org.uk/publications/blacklisting-need-public-inquiry-including-manifesto-against-blacklisting
February 5, 2018
