teachers are questioning
Burnham structure, and the authority of the D.E.S. to determine who it negotiates with.
Silentnight strike Bed firm workers wake up to union struggle By JACK SHARPLES THE owner of the Silentnight bedding firm. Mr Tom Clarke, has a shareholding worth over £7m and personal wealth ex- ceeding £50m. He started up in business on his demob pay. making matresses in his front room and eventually built up a large factory in Barnoldswick. Lancs., and has since expanded by buying up other companies. When Mrs Thatcher visited the Silentnight showrooms about 15 christened months she ago "Mr Wonderful". Clarke ex- pressing her admiration for the man and holding him up as an example to the rest of British industry. Just why she thinks he is so wonderful has become clear. About three years ago Clarke told the local press that he had the best workforce in the coun- try. This was part of an article reporting yet another record- breaking profit by Silentnight. That same workforce has now been sacked. The turnover of workers has been very low in that intervening period. The only difference is that the workforce has now become unionised. Historically, the annual pay rise at the Silentnight factory in Barnoldwick has since 1978 been
ALWAYS TOGETHER workers accompanied by a change in job values which has virtually wiped out the cost of the pay rises. After such a rate cutting exercise in February 1984 the workforce decided as a body that for once they were not going to accept, and a walkout resulted. On the morning of the walkout there were about 20 members of FTAT (Furniture, Timber and Allied Trades Union) at the factory. By the end of the day there were over 600, and Barnoldswick has been unionised ever since.
The current dispute has arisen because of management's desire for a confrontation. In December 1984, 88 employees were declared redundant. At the beginning of 1985 the Company gave a guarantee that no further jobs would be lost if the workers accepted a postponement of their nationally negotiated wage increase for a period of three or Socialist Viewpoint No. 9 December 1985 p9
FORWARD TOGETHER~ 50 SACKED support the Silentnight
FATU four months. The workers agreed
- yet just 8 weeks later, another 52 redundancies were announced. As the management had reneged on their side of the bargain, the workers pressed for the implementation of the pay award. The management refused.
Tom Clarke sacked the manager who had made the "no redundancies" deal and offered an increase to be offset against Serpent to time to worn ple respect to time-rate working. Silentnight workers are payment-by-result workers, the effect was that the majority would get little or no increase at all. A secret ballot was held on industrial action and resulted in a 354-203 majority in favout of a work to rule. The workers in one department were then suspended and on June 10 the remainder took