‘ROUSE, YE WOMEN!’

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: july/august 2022 :: RMTnews 26 In 1910 the women chain makers of Cradley Heath laid down their tools to strike for a living wage and the successful 10-week strike more than doubled their wages and gained international recognition. Led by the legendary union organiser and campaigner, Mary Macarthur, the dispute made the principle of a national minimum wage a reality. The work was hot, physically demanding and poorly paid, an example of a "sweated" trade, where workers (often women) were paid a pittance to produce cheap goods. The Trade Boards Act of 1909 set up regulatory boards to enforce minimum rates of pay for workers in four of the most exploited industries - chain-making, box-making, lace-making and clothing. The Chain Trade Board announced a minimum wage but many employers refused to pay the increase. In response, the women's union, the National Federation of Women Workers (NFWW), called the strike. Union founder Mary Macarthur used mass meetings and the media to bring the situation of the striking women to a wider audience and developed a strike fund raising over £4,000. At the end of the strike Mary Macarthur proposed that surplus money in the strike fund should be used to build a ‘centre of social and industrial activity in the district’. Thousands of local people turned out for the opening of The Cradley Heath Workers’ Institute in 1912. The Institute was moved brick by brick to the Black Country Living Museum in 2006 where it now stands as a memorial of the women’s struggles which is celebrated with a festival every year. RMT’s first elected female regional organiser Kathy Mazur told festival goers that struggle of women workers over a hundred years ago was still inspiring workers today. “Just as the women of Cradley Heath took on their employers who refused to pay decent wages, over 40,000 transport workers in RMT carried out the largest strike action for a generation this month against low pay, jobs cuts and attacks on terms and conditions. ‘ROUSE, YE WOMEN!’ RMT regional organiser Kathy Mazur addresses the annual chain makers' strike festival in the Midlands Kathy Mazur