Betrayal at Glencroft
Socialist Organiser1981 1981-11-26Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 2 →
Transcribed from the scan 25 Oct 2026 after a reader report on this page: the machine reading had run in part of Victory in Nursery Fight, the 'Help us make our circulation JUMP!' advert and the end of SWP Silences its Women's Voice.
Proofed text: read against the scan word by word; spelling, punctuation and wording are as printed.
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LAST Friday, 20 November, National Union of Hosiery and Knitwear Workers officials ordered an end to the picketing of the Glencroft Knitwear firm in Glasgow, which for the 15 weeks previously had been picketed by 15 women sacked from the firm for joining the union.
The withdrawal of picketing is only the latest stage in the tortuously slow killing off of the dispute by the union full-timers:
*No appeal for mass picketing has ever been made by the union.
*No efforts have been made to ensure effective blacking of Glencroft exports due for export.
*Moves by the women to launch a boycott of Glencroft products in shops were blocked by officials, who argued that it was illegal to appeal to people not to buy them.
*Throughout the dispute officials have cast a veil of secrecy over what, if anything, they were up to.
Tribunal
Now, on top of all this, comes the end of picketing, allegedly on the grounds that the key focus of attention must now be the forthcoming Industrial Tribunal which will preside over the dispute.
But the real purpose of this move is to facilitate the delivery of the death blow to the dispute.
The women are now isolated from each other (and from the revolutionaries who turned up on the picket lines) and it is no longer possible to use the picketing as a focus for building support for the women.
The stage has thus been set for the final execution.
The union will take the case to an Industrial Tribunal, lose it (legally they haven't got a leg to stand on) and then call it a day.
Messages/money: c/o NUHKW, 44 Kelvingrove St., Glasgow G3.
STAN CROOKE