The P&O Seafarers Strike (Britain 1988 -1989)

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In December 1987 P&O told the seafarers' union - the National Union of Seamen (NUS) - that it planned to slash £6 million off its £35 million annual wage bill.

Ferry workers at the port of Dover would see 500 of their 2,300 jobs disappear and be forced to work one extra month a year under new rosters that would see some seafarers work continuously for 72 hours.

The 2,300 ferry workers at Dover refused to accept P&O's ultimatums and the threat they would pose to passenger safety (P&O's recent announcement of record profits - including £51.7 million from its European Ferries - did not help either).

On February 6, 1988 they voted to strike and stopped work. P&O responded by sacking every single one of the 2,300 Dover ferry workers.

Seafarers across Britain saw P&O's attack as an attack on them all. They knew that other companies would follow P&O's job cuts. NUS members were therefore keen to come to the aid of the Dover workers.

National strike ballot cancelled
Rank and file pressure for action saw the NUS leadership call for a strike ballot of the union's 21,000 members. Early indications showed a decisive two to one majority for action.

Talk of a national strike ballot saw the ferry owners scurry to the courts. The judges obliged by declaring that the dispute only affected P&O Dover workers and handed down a court injunction that threatened the sequestration of the union's funds.

Midway through the ballot the NUS leadership called it off. This back down signalled a determination by the NUS leadership/bureaucracy of Sam McCluskie to remain within the law.

Once again union leaders trembled before the judges and the Conservative (Tory) Party's anti-union laws.

The cancellation of the ballot angered the mass of seafarers, particularly the P&O workers, who were now left isolated.

Mass pickets at Dover
Denied the weapon of national industrial action by the NUS leaders, Dover ferry workers nevertheless fought a brave fight. Mass picketing by the seafarers and supporters (mainly ex-miners led by Terry French, a Kent Miner sacked and imprisoned during the 1984-5 Miners Strike) was initially successful. A number of trucks booked on rival ferry operator Sealink were turned back.

However, the deployment of huge numbers of police soon assisted the scab truck and bus drivers to break the picket lines. The Transport and General Workers Union did not call upon truck drivers to respect the seafarers' picket lines.

No attempts were made by the NUS officials to organise the pickets into a militant disciplined grouping who could have defended themselves against the police attacks.

The NUS also later disassociated themselves from the small teams who moved away from the police on the picket line and began stoning and bricking P&O Ferrymaster trucks on the major roads to and from Dover.

The picketing did stop people going to work. For almost two months P&O ferries lay idle. The ferries only sailed after an elaborate operation involving the flying of scabs to the European continent, a brief training programme for new crew members, and the sailing of ferries with a skeleton crew.

It was to be some time before the strike breakers felt confident enough to walk past the pickets.

The NUS estimated that the dispute cost the company £40 million. Sir Jeffrey (Lord) Sterling, P&O Chairman and personal friend of Margaret Thatcher, was more than willing to spend this amount in order to break working class organisation and resistance.

Union funds sequestered
In Easter 1988 P&O announced that it had de-recognised the NUS and was pulling out of the Industry's National Maritime Board agreements. Sealink NUS members in Dover, recognising that this was an attack on the union in general and the rights of seafarers to defend themselves, decided not to cross the P&O picket lines.

It was thus Sealink management who took the NUS to court for secondary picketing as NUS Sealink members across the country escalated their actions and all Sealink ships came to a standstill. The key now was to stay out and get others out. Flying pickets were needed to take the message to all ports throughout the country.

The courts ordered the sequestration of the assets of the NUS. Its offices were seized, staff pay was stopped and investment funds frozen.

At first McCluskie threatened defiance and declared that he would rather go to jail rather than give in to the courts. This defiance opened up the potential for mass defiance of the anti-trade union laws. However, as soon as the courts seized the union's funds McCluskie gave in.

After just nine days, and only three days after a 2,000 strong supporters' march in Dover, the NUS purged its contempt and ordered Sealink workers back to work. Sealink workers reluctantly agreed, leaving P&O workers on strike on their own.

The workers were not prepared or able to disobey their union leadership. (Incidentally the union did not, at this point, get its assets and funds back as the injunction by Sealink was lifted, only to be replaced by one from P&O itself).

Ultimately this was the key point in the strike, a threat to all ferry operators in Britain became replaced by a dispute between an increasingly isolated workforce and a confident anti-union international employer supported by the government, police and the courts.

Strikers continued picketing, money continued to be raised for families and to maintain the support kitchens operating in the Dover area, speakers continued to raise the issues at meetings and demonstrations. Yet the strategy to win the dispute remained absent. Indeed many strikers seemed reluctant to even ask “how to win?” as the dispute dragged on until it was formally abandoned by the NUS leadership after sixteen months.

Some lessons
For future strikes, it is worth bearing in mind the following lessons:
* Trade Union Officials are not prepared to organise and defy the anti-trade union laws.
* The key to winning disputes is organising flying pickets and going directly to workers in their workplace.
* Workers in struggle [and preferably before it] need to adopt a policy of organisation and action independent of the full-time officials.
* Where workers are not prepared to break the anti-trade union laws when used against them then they are defeated.
* There must be established a network of rank and file workers organisations, in this case amongst seafarers, which can and will operate independently of the full-time officials.
* The defence of the picket-line from police attacks is vital and proper stewarding is needed, legal monitoring needs arranging and sympathetic solicitors need to be on hand to help anyone arrested.

[In 1990 the National Union of Seamen amalgamated with the National Union of Railwaymen to form the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT)].

Based on an article from Fighting to Win, available from http://www.red-star-research.org.uk/rpm/