Empty Threats

A few evenings ago, I watched "Made In Dagenham" for the first time. If you've never seen it, the film is a fictional account of a true event; the struggle of female machinists at Ford's Dagenham plant for equal pay. From a distance of more than 45 years, it seems incredible that anyone would think that it was ever acceptable for women to earn half the wages of men doing similarly skilled jobs.

However what caught my attention was the rhetoric employed by one of the characters, Robert Tooley (played by Richard Schiff). I am, of course, aware that this is fiction and that the dialogue has been dramatised. I can well imagine though that similar sentiments were expressed by the real protagonists representing Ford.

Tooley is a Ford executive who is flown over from Detroit to break the Dagenham strike. He realises quickly that he needs to undermine the support the women are receiving from the (mainly male) union. Tooley tells Monty Taylor, one of the union stewards, that if Ford pulls out of the UK, then there will be no members paying union subscriptions and he'll be out of a job. Tooley also flatly states that businesses can't afford to pay men and women equally, and that they will go bankrupt if forced to. Taylor takes immediate steps to marginalise the female strikers.

Eventually, with the plant at a standstill, the Employment Secretary Barbara Castle meets with Tooley. With a voice laden with impending doom, Tooley tells Castle that if the female strikers get their way, Ford will no longer be able to produce cars at a profit. Tooley issues an explicit threat that Ford will make their cars elsewhere.

History records that Castle helped resolve the strike, bringing the women's pay to 92% of the men's rate almost immediately, and that this dispute paved the way for the Equal Pay Act of 1970. The Act came into effect in 1975.

Contrary to the expectations of the prophets of doom, the sun rose the next morning, and fell beneath the western sky the following evening. Ford carried on making cars, in the UK, and at a profit. With the passage of the 1970 Act, businesses up and down the country continued to function despite paying women equal pay for equal work.

I suspect that two things worked in the favour of the machinists. The first was that there was a Labour government, which until the 1990s was proud of its working class roots and would stand up for the rights of the ordinary worker. Secondly, Barbara Castle was an extraordinary woman with extraordinary conviction. A lesser person, male or female, might not have dared arrange such a radical solution to the strike. I have no doubt that a Conservative government would not have produced such a favourable outcome.

Why is this relevant today? Earlier I drew your attention to the rhetoric. We can see now with hindsight that this was not an objective business case talking, but instead it was greed taking priority over principle and using threats to bolster its case. It is doubtful whether Ford really would have pulled out of the UK. I suspect that when it came down to it, the logistics didn't stack up. Ford knew that they had a lucrative customer base in the UK, and that whilst it would have been possible to supply the UK market with cars from overseas, it wouldn't have been practical with the required volume.

The point I am making here - albeit perhaps not too clearly - is that we are hearing similar threats made by various parties with vested interests. Banks claim that their best employees will leave if their bonuses are capped or stopped, and other similarly impartial commentators have voiced the opinion that Labour's proposed reinstatement of the 50p tax band is anti-business and will cause businesses to leave the UK. These are the same people who claimed that the introduction of the minimum wage in 1997 would cause a recession. It didn't.

Maybe we should just take their threats, like Tooley's, with a pinch of salt. Greed should never come before principle. It won't happen today though. I couldn't honestly say whether with the current Government it is caused by greed or cowardice. Maybe both. Neither serves the interests of the country.