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| Nottingham Evening Post strikers 30 years on - photo by Rebecca Mckevitt |
Former Nottingham Evening Post journalists who were on strike together 30 years ago met up again on Saturday 7 March for an anniversary reunion. They travelled from all over the country and toasted the other journalists and trade union members who gave them inspiring support during tough times.
The 28 reporters and sub-editors from the old Forman Street offices took part in a provincial journalists’ strike which began on December 5, 1978 and ended just over six weeks later, on January 17, 1979. The Evening Post journalists were happy with their pay and conditions, but they joined the National Union of Journalists strike because it aimed to win improvements for low-paid reporters in the north.
Yet they never returned to the Evening Post, because then managing director Christopher Pole-Carew sacked them for being “disloyal”. It was the only paper in the country not to take back its journalists when the strike ended. The sacked included a blind reporter and a young mother-to-be. The Post also threatened to evict journalists and their young families from company-owned flats at Wilford.
Bill Snaith, the then editor of the Evening Post, had told a delegation before the strike began he understood why they were going on strike and would welcome them all back when the dispute was over. He said he had been on strike himself twenty years earlier. Because of his empty promise, a very low-key picket was initially mounted.
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| Reinstate Nottingham Journalists - NUJ Poster |
NUJ peace moves were met with startling hostility. Regional organiser Mike Bower was repeatedly rebuffed by Pole-Carew. On one occasion, he claims to have been assaulted by a heavy when he entered the Evening Post building with NUJ father-of-the-chapel Kevin Hill, now a BBC Television producer. Mike said this week: “My outstanding memory among all the passion and turmoil of the dispute was being with the pickets one day and not much was going on when someone pointed out Pole-Carew walking down the street away from the offices. So I went off after him, of course, and repeatedly asked for meetings, communication, efforts to end the dispute amicably. He didn't respond to any of this apart from lengthening his already huge strides thus requiring me to be jogging to keep up. Eventually he stopped, turned to me and bawled: ‘Why don't you shove orff, you scruffy little man’ and resumed his striding and leaving me speechless for one of the few times in my life.”
But Pole-Carew’s ruthless approach was perhaps understandable. His industrial warfare tactics, spelled out in a talk to other newspaper bosses, are alleged to have included humiliating and discrediting union officials. This included making sure they had to stand throughout discussions. He also said he did his best to make sure meetings over-ran so the union men missed their last bus or train home.
But the strikers were determined and resourceful. While Forman Street picketing continued, they brought out their own newspaper, the Nottingham News, with sparkling exclusives and superior sports coverage. The Nottingham News was sold directly on the streets of Nottingham. The public was very supportive: circulation of the Evening Post dropped from 150,000 to 78,000 initially and some still refuse to buy it to this day. The Co-op was among those placing full-page ads with the Nottingham News and Forest Manager Brian Clough refused to have anything to do with the Evening Post. Sir Michael Parkinson (now Chancellor of Nottingham Trent University) also wrote features for the Nottingham News. Voluntary helpers joined the 28 and Sheffield-based Mike Bower, the NUJ regional organiser, who went on to become leader of Sheffield City Council, was a tremendous encouragement.
But eventually, the strikers moved on. Three years after the strike the issue of the Nottingham News with a March 19, 1982 dateline was the last. A number of the journalists became successful freelancers. Some joined The Mirror, the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Daily Express as subs and reporters. Some became newspaper and magazine editors. Others moved into PR or journalism lecturing, or became press officers, TV executives and producers. One even became general manager of Nottingham Panthers ice-hockey team!
The Nottingham reunion last Saturday (March 7) was organised after four of the 28 strikers took part in a Radio Nottingham programme on the strike.
Striker and Ex-journalism lecturer Terry Wootton said: "It was fantastic for us to be back together again after 30 years — a night to remember. In sacking the 28, the Post lost a very talented team of gritty newsmen and women. But in a strange way, it did us all a favour — because everyone became stronger, and we all did better things with our lives.”
He added: "The challenge of finding everybody 30 years on seemed daunting at first. But the search was exhilaratingly successful. And it was very rewarding to discover how everyone had gone on to tip-top jobs in the industry."
There are, however, still three names on the where-are-they-now? list. They are Robin Anderson, who edited the now defunct Delegates magazine in London before moving to Northumberland, Paul Cowan ex-editor of the Stornoway Gazette and Peter Anderson, who worked as a sub-editor in Loughborough and Peterborough.
Anyone who can help locate them should email Terry Wootton or phone 0115 9123018.
