Jimmy Reid - 1932 – 2010
October 2020
James “Jimmy” Reid was a Scottish trade union activist, orator, politician and journalist. His role as spokesman and one of the leaders in the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders work-in between June 1971 and October 1972 attracted international recognition. He later served as Rector of the University of Glasgow and subsequently became a journalist and broadcaster. He had been a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), but later joined the Labour Party. After supporting the Scottish Socialist Party in the late 1990s, he joined the Scottish National Party in 2005 and fully supported Scottish Independence. He died in 2010 after a long illness.
Jimmy was born on 9 July 1932 in Govan, Glasgow which was a major British shipbuilding centre. In his youth, Jimmy joined the Young Communist League and was later a member of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). He was involved in organising a major apprentices' strike at the Clyde shipyards in 1951.
Reid came to prominence in the early 1970s, when he led the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders work-in to try to stop Edward Heath’s Conservative government from closing down the shipyards on the River Clyde. The government had decided that the shipyards should operate without state subsidy, which would have resulted in at least six thousand job losses. An engineer by trade and shop steward of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers, Reid, along with his colleagues Jimmy Airlie, Sammy Gilmore and Sammy Barr, decided that the best way to show the viability of keeping the yards open was by staging a 'work-in' rather than by going on strike. This meant that the workers would continue to complete what orders the shipyard had until the government changed policy.
In a famous speech given to the workers, Reid announced the beginning of workers' control of the shipyard and insisted on self-discipline while this was in force:
“We are not going to strike. We are not even having a sit-in strike. Nobody and nothing will come in and nothing will go out without our permission. And there will be no hooliganism, there will be no vandalism, there will be no bevvying because the world is watching us, and it is our responsibility to conduct ourselves with responsibility, and with dignity, and with maturity.”
Jimmy Reid marching with Tony Benn during the 1971 Clyde shipbuilders work-in.
The occupation received support from across the world, with a series of fundraising events and foreign unions, celebrities (such as John Lennon and Billy Connolly) and members of the public providing donations. The campaign was successful in persuading Heath to back down the following year, and the Clyde shipyards received £101 million in public support over the next three years.
He was elected as a Communist councillor in Clydebank, where, prior to the local government reform of the mid-1970s, there were a few Communist councillors. He stood for the Communist Party of Great Britain in East Dunbartonshire in the 1970 general election.
Reid also served as Rector of the University of Glasgow, elected in 1971, largely on the back of his union activities. When installed as Rector, he gave a critically acclaimed speech, which became known as "the rat-race speech". The New York Times printed the speech in full and described it as "the greatest speech since President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address".
“Reject the values and false morality that underlie these attitudes. A rat race is for rats. We're not rats. We're human beings. Reject the insidious pressures in society that would blunt your critical faculties to all that is happening around you, that would caution silence in the face of injustice lest you jeopardise your chances of promotion and self-advancement. This is how it starts and before you know where you are, you're a fully paid-up member of the rat-pack. The price is too high. It entails the loss of your dignity and human spirit. Or as Christ put it, "What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his soul?"
The above is a quote from Jimmy Reid’s great Rectorial address at Glasgow University in 1972 which you can see here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b3xa104bGVY (this is just 2 minutes long).
In early 1973, Kenneth Williams (of “Carry On… “ fame) was a guest on the Parkinson Show, with actress Maggie Smith and Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman. He became involved in a heated exchange with Michael Parkinson over the conduct of the trade union movement, and social and political ideologies more generally.
Although by today's standards it was fairly mild, it garnered such a reaction that Kenneth was invited back to debate with union leader Jimmy Reid for a special show.
At that time Jimmy Reid had recently taken on the Heath government, staging a "work-in" at Upper-Clyde Shipbuilders in protest against plans to close the shipyard, with the loss of up to 6000 jobs. The unusual industrial action received global attention, and the Heath government backed down, extending subsidies to keep the yard operating.
The full Parkinson show (along with a short clip of what Kenneth Williams said from the previous show) can be seen here. Kenneth Williams is at times engaging and funny, but Jimmy Reid’s basic humanity shines through in his comments and views. It lasts 1 hour 11 mins, but is well worth watching.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylTnvLl4aIk
In the February 1974 general election, Reid stood for the Communist Party in Central Dunbartonshire, which was dominated by the town of Clydebank, against sitting Labour member Hugh McCartney. He got 14.6% of the vote, the best result for a Communist Party candidate in Britain for some time, but it seemed like a disappointment, as some thought he might win. It was a controversial campaign; the ballot paper described him as "Engineering Worker," which some thought was disguising his Communist identity. One Roman Catholic priest gave a sermon advising his parishioners only to vote for candidates whose beliefs were consistent with Christian principles. In his speech at the count, Reid described his opponents as "Falangists" in reference to their perceived Catholic nationalism. He stood again in October 1974, when his vote was down to 8.7%.
Around 1975, Reid left the Communist Party. The breakaway Scottish Labour Party considered recruiting him, but its leader Jim Sillars said: "If we have that chap in, he'll be taking time away from me on the box".
About a year after he left the CP, Reid joined the Labour Party. He was their candidate in Dundee East in 1979, but lost to then Scottish National Party (SNP) leader Gordon Wilson. The decision by Dundee East Constituency Labour Party to select him as their candidate was controversial, as he had been a party member for less than the two years normally expected. He is sometimes referred to as "the best MP Scotland never had".
Jimmy then became a journalist and broadcaster, writing opinion columns for various newspapers, including The Daily Mirror, The Herald, The Sun and The Scotsman. He also presented a chat-show called the Reid Report for Grampian Television. In 1984, he wrote and presented a series of documentaries entitled Reid About the USSR, when his previous status within the Communist Party gave him unprecedented access and resulted in two BAFTA awards. In 2000, he helped establish the Scottish Left Review, a bi-monthly publication. He also wrote an "As I Please" column in Tribune.
Reid was highly critical of the 1984-85 UK Miners’ strike and its leader Arthur Scargill in his newspaper column. Reid argued that the working miners could not properly be referred to as strikebreakers, as no national ballot was held and no local ballot had passed a resolution to strike. He said on the matter:
“A scab is someone who participates in a vote in which the majority are for taking strike action and then refuses to honour the decision. If you are denied the right to vote it is impossible to be a scab. “
Reid's stance led to his coming under strong criticism from many former supporters in the Labour movement; he was described by Mick McGahey as "Broken Reid".
Reid continued to support Labour up until the 1997 general election, but thereafter became disillusioned with the New Labour phenomenon. In 1998, he urged people to support the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) in the first elections to the new Scottish parliament. In the 2004 SNP leadership contest, he urged SNP members to support Alex Salmond for leader and Nicola Sturgeon for deputy leader, and he joined the party in the following year.
In 2007, a play by the writer Brian McGeachan about Reid's life was performed. Entitled From Govan to Gettysburg, it starred John Cairney and toured as part of Jimmy Reid's 75th birthday celebrations.
Reid retired to Rothesay on the Isle of Bute. On 10 August 2010, Reid died at Inverclyde Royal Hospital. He had suffered a brain haemorrhage earlier in the week and had been in poor health for a number of years.
After a private service in Rothesay, his hearse was driven into Glasgow for a secular funeral service at the Govan Old Parish Church on 19 August. The cortege passed the BAE Systems Surface Ships yard in Govan, one of the Shipyards saved after the collapse of UCS, where hundreds of workers had gathered outside in tribute. The funeral service at Govan Old was attended by notable figures including Ed Balls, Ed Milliband, Gordon Brown, Alex Salmond, Sir Alex Ferguson and Sir Billy Connolly.
He was survived by his wife Joan, three daughters and three granddaughters, one of whom, Joani Reid is a Labour Party Councillor in the London Borough of Lewisham.
The left-wing think tank and advocacy group, the Jimmy Reid Foundation (http://reidfoundation.org/ ), was established in his memory by the Editorial Board of the Scottish Left Review.
Solidarity
Brian Madican
October 2020
