A VICTORY AT LONGBRIDGE: One of the strikers

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blocks Cowley strike on the sec- ShoD. The Paint Shop nieht to on hark and den Police raids on Longbridge workers' homes are nothing new, but this year it's been worse than ever and it's been stores workers in particular who've been suffering.

In January a black worker, Junior, had his house turned over by-the cops and was beaten up in the police station. He was completely innocent and nothing was found.

• Ihen,: on Wednesday March 2nd, storeman, Tom, on the 10-2 shift in CABI, was raided just as he was about to leave home for work. There were three civil police plus two BL security people.

They found three flasher units and two bulbs, but these were too old to have been stolen from Long bridge. One of the BL security men claimed that a spanner of a very common type could have been stolen from Longbridge.

Five days later, this worker was called into the office and suspended suspicion of theft. No stewards had been informed of any of this - the first the stewards knew was when Tom returned on Tuesday, after his 24-hour suspension.

Colin Willetts from the Works Committee went into the office with Tom and a local steward.

John Yeats, the Unit 2 industrial relations manager, and Dave Harbash, the superintendent, met them and made it clear that they intended to sack Tom.

•The stores blokes held a meeting the next day, Wednesday, and endorsed the action of Willetts and the local stewards in defending Tom.

As the meeting broke up, there was a call from the floor of the meeting demanding strike action if anything similar occuried or if Tom was in fact sacked.

Amazingly, just five hours later, exactly the same thing happened again, this time to a worker on the night shift. Interesting y, as wels, it was the same police station as the previous case, Droitwich.

Searched

Five coppers plus someone else in plain clothes - it could have been a BL security man - had gone into this worker's home.

They searched everywhere, in his loft, the lot. The only thing they didn't do was dig his garden up.

Well of course, when this bloke came in, everyone on the night shift was furious. They'd already heard about what happened on days, and they wanted action.

As the 6am-2pm shift came on (it overlaps with the night shift), the night blokes told everyone what had happened.

The day and night stewards called a meeting of all the storemen, and the locsi management flew into a real panic. It was like a Burton's shop window come to life with all the dummies running about in their suits!

Harbash, the superintendent, collared the stewards and pleaded with them to get the blokes back to work.

The management offered talks in exchange for a resumption of work. The stewards put this to the blokes, who replied 'Bollocks' Then two drivers' stewards came over and said, 'Do you mind if our people join in your meeting?' So we held a joint meeting with the drivers.

When the 6-2 shift and the day shift heard all the details about what had happened on nights they wanted action. They wanted to know why, how, and by whom the search warrants had been issued.

From the floor of the meeting came a proposal for immediate strike for the rest of the week (it was now Thursday) and a further meeting on Monday. The stewards asked the movers to withdraw this, which they did.

But the blokes were insistent about Tom, the bloke who had been suspended and threatened with the sack.

We want him back' they all said.

The stewards reported this to industrial relations boss Gwyn Evans, who replied simply that he would not talk! while we were in dispute.

Chaos

Then the stewards col lared CAB1 industrial relations boss Bernard Monaghan, who claimed total innocence - 'All I know is that the police say they received an anony mous tip-off, he said.

Everyone just laughed at this. Meanwhile, chaos reigned in CAB1. Plant manager Tound She tracks telling ins the production workers they were laid off. At the same time local supervision was telling them that they weren't, and at the gates, the works police were trying to get them to go back inside.

Then Jack Adams, the convenor, came up from the Works Committee and suggested reconvening the shop meeting to get the blokes back to work while he tried to sort things out withthe management.

The local stewards went along with this, mainly I think because they were all a bit confused and didn't know what to do for the best. The whole issue was far-reaching, and we hadn't formulated any precise demands, although the general feeling was that we wanted access to Company files on employees and details of their relationship with the civil police.

and the sist Organiset Middle Lane, London N8 for 60p including postage. JOHN HARRIS Adams: pushed for return to work Anyway, the meeting was reconvened • and Adams put a resolution calling lor return to work. This was massively defeated and the day-shift drivers and storemen all went home.

Meanwhile, in the CAB2 area (which covers the Ital tracks) drivers and storemen held a separate meeting and all came out in solidarity.

When the 2pm shift came in, they held a meeting and voted to go home even before the steward had finished moving the resolution!

robots can't produce cars on their own!

_eacers1 Manning struggles have erupted at BL's Cowley Body Plant. We reported last week the victorious opposition to manning cuts on the Rover/ Ambassador build line.

This was victorious because the workers insisted on implementing the plant policy of calling a mass meeting in defence of any section in confrontation over manning.

The leadership have opposed this: Senior steward Bill Roche has argued through his section to give the company's manning a try. He opposed the spreading of the action. At the mass meeting he argued against the plant going out on strike.

But the was vic- strike was victorious and the status quo On nights the same resolution - the Works Committee's proposal for a return to work - was again put, but there wasn't even a seconder for it, so the night shift storemen and drivers all walked out.

The tracks were laid off at 9.35 pm on Thursday night. Earlier on Thursday Tom, the suspended worker, had gone to see management along with Colin Willetts from the Works Committee.

Monaghan and Rowley from the Company finally agreed that there was no case for Tom to answer and apologised. Tom was paid all the shift allowance and bonus owed to him, as well as his basic rate.

When the day shift came in the stewards and Works Committee put the same resolution as the day before, and again it was rejected.

The 2pm shift didn't come in at all. At around am on Friday, the stores in the tast Works came out in support and a bit • latel, drivers and storemen in the North Works and the South was installed tion.

As soon as the plant returned to work on Wednesday, the company hit out in all directions to try and undo the success.

Stewards were disciplined; manning cuts took place; workers on the Maestro stopped work on Wednesday morning as did workers on the Ambassador final line. • On Thursday morning, Bill Roche was warned by management for saying to the Oxford Mail that a 'formula' had got a return to work and not a company victory." He was also warned for addressing the first mass On Thursday afternoon the Acciaim stopped over manning and so did the Paint Works did the same, halting all the engine supplies to Cowley: But the stewards were stuck. What should they be going for? What demands should they be raising?

A meeting was arranged for Friday between the stores stewards, the Works Committee and the T&G full-timer, Sam Robinson. All Robinson seemed concerned about was getting bad publicity in the Press!

By this time the locat stewards had drawn up a list of demands including the stopping of raids on workers' homes 'on information received' , public apologies from the Company and the police to the workers who'd been raided, the right of access to your own records from the Personnel Department.

For some reason, apparently, Adams got very angry about these demands and seemed to think that the local stewards were upping the stakes to prolong the strike. Finally, it was agreed to call another meeting on ey Shop. The Paint Shop night shift followed the day shift as they tried to enforce the factory policy of mass meetings by both going out onto the sports field first thing in the morning on Friday.

The leadership and the District Official, David Buckle, called a shop stewards' meeting and spent four hours trying to talk the stewards out of backing the Paint Shop.

This was unsuccessful. But as large numbers of stewards abstained in the vote, the leadership declared that although the resolution was carried, the vote wasn't big enough and therefore the Paint Shop had to go back to work.

But still a meeting of Paint Shop workers refused Monday for all the drivers and store workers from

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