DISPLACED WORKERS

Greymouth Evening Star, 2 November 1944, Page 5

DISPLACED WORKERS

DEMONSTRATION IN LONDON.

(Rec. 10.45) LONDON, Nov. 1. Thousands of London aircraft workers, mostly young men and women, demonstrated outside the Commons, to-day, as a protest against being thrown out of employment as redundant. The crowd carried banners with the slogans “Redundant workers demand full employment—ls this worth fighting for? We want work not the dole.”

While the police marshalled the crowd, a deputation entered the Commons and protested to Members. The demonstrators’ typewritten statement stated their managements had informed them the contract for building heavy aircraft would cease on completion of a specified number, and several factories would cease production in a few months. Sixteen hundred employees at two of A. V. Roe Company’s north-west England factories, producing Lancasters, are on strike over a wages agreement. A general strike throughout the firm’s works, involving 30,000 employees, is threatened unless an early settlement is reached. Strikers rejected the advice of the District Committee to return to work pending negotiations. Between 6000 and 8000 men and women workers in a north-western aircraft factory controlled by the Ministry of Aircraft Production hav/ been advised that contracts cease in April and the factory closes in July. Tine factory cost £1,000,000 to build. It has been producing frames for Blenheims, Beauforts, and Halifaxes.