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LUCAS AEROSPACE
COMBINE SHOP
STEWARDS' COMMITTEE

THE LUCAS PLAN AND THE LUCAS AEROSPACE COMBINE SHOP STEWARDS’ COMMITTEE WEBSITE

Contact Us




WELCOME TO OUR WEBSITE



Over the last four decades and more since the launch of the Lucas Plan in 1976,
acres of print and miles of film have been produced to discuss the Plan and the
issues raised within it. The discussion continues, as the issues raised in the
Plan are even more pertinent today, and far more urgent, particularly given our
environmental problems and the dominance of the arms trade.

Prompted by the conference, organised by the New Lucas Plan Group and held in
Birmingham on 26th November 2016 to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the
launch of the Plan, we (former Combine members) decided to put some of our own
material and memories on line. We felt that a site established by former Combine
members was long overdue. New material will be added over time, some previously
unpublished, some buried for years. We will be happy to receive material on the
Plan and Combine which may be new or lost to us. Additionally the website is to
commemorate the Combine’s achievements in the 1970s and to encourage similar
“bottom up” initiatives from workers and communities now and in the future. The
Combine’s Plan demonstrated that an alternative ‘bottom up’ approach to the use
of technology that answers social needs, is more cost effective to the taxpayer
and creates more jobs for a given amount of public expenditure.

Hopefully, those who access this site, will be able to apply a similar approach
when faced with the same problems as the Lucas workers all those years ago. We
believe our process is applicable to most situations. If the information on this
website helps workers or community activists provide an answer to the problems
they face, it will have achieved a major objective.

This website is dedicated to the Lucas Aerospace workforce and their supporters
– without their socially useful productive ideas, the Combine Shop Stewards’
Committee would not have been able to draw up the their alternative Plan.

For the record, the original title of the Lucas Plan, as it is now known
is: ‘Corporate Plan: a contingency strategy as a positive alternative to
recession and redundancies’

The content of the website has been compiled by former Combine members Phil
Asquith, John Routley and Brian Salisbury, with the support of Mike Cooney, Bob
Dodd and Ron Mills and the inspiration of the late Mike Cooley, Ernie Scarbrow
and Danny Conroy. If there are any other surviving members of the Combine out
there please get in touch and we will be delighted to hear from you.

We would like to give a special thank you to

UNISON WEST MIDLANDS FIRE SERVICE BRANCH

Who has kindly sponsored the development of this website.


THE HISTORY OF THE LASSC

‘Without the Combine there wouldn’t have been a Lucas Plan’

Lucas Aerospace, a part of the Lucas Industries Group, was a major manufacturer
of aerospace components. It employed 18,000 highly skilled manual and staff
workers on its 17 sites. The workforce had a strong and effective trade union
representation involving 12 manual and staff trade unions. Because Lucas
Aerospace management made corporate decisions centrally, the shop stewards
realised that the multi trade union structure that existed made it difficult for
the workforce, through its elected representatives, to respond in a coherent
manner. So the democratically elected senior stewards of both manual and staff
unions from all the Lucas Aerospace sites combined and formed a committee which
was representative of the entire workforce.


The Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Stewards’ Committee was an addition to the
existing trade union structure, ensuring that individual unions retained their
own autonomy and negotiating rights. Liaison or joint shop stewards’ committees
also operated on most sites, again dealing with issues of a common nature. The
Combine met on a regular basis with any recommendations reached being reported
back to the individual sites for decisions to be reached democratically. Between
meetings, liaison took place between sites by telephone. Information was shared
and when necessary, support was given to individual sites.

The Combine was effective in preventing management playing one site off against
another. Although not an official negotiating body, the Combine through
information sharing, provided support when necessary. It proved to be an
effective trade union body and a thorn in the side of management. In its
strategy development role, the Combine enabled individual craft unions to
negotiate from a position of strength. As the Combine’s influence grew, it
played a major role in improving both works’ and staff pensions, drawing on the
knowledge of individuals within the workforce who, although not employed in the
pension field, had a natural expertise, which they provided voluntarily to aid
the members. For more details of the formation of the Combine and the politics
surrounding it, we recommend Hilary Wainwright and Dave Elliott’s book, The
Lucas Plan – a new trade unionism in the making?

In the early 1970s the national aerospace Industry was being restructured,
actively encouraged by Government. The Combine could see that Lucas Aerospace
would be affected. During an historic meeting in November 1974 with Tony Benn,
the Government’s Secretary of State for Industry, the Combine was encouraged to
develop an alternative strategy for the company. When the Combine next met it
decided to draw up an alternative Corporate Plan with the full involvement of
the Lucas Aerospace workforce.

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