Trades Unions Congress (1970 - 1987)

IDENTITY STATEMENT AREA

Reference code(s): MSS.292D

Title: Trades Unions Congress (1970 - 1987)

Date(s): 1970 - 1987

Level of description: Fond

Extent and medium of the unit of description: 80.64 cu. m.

CONTEXT AREA

Name of creator(s): Trades Union Congress

Administrative/Biographical history: The TUC was formed in Manchester in 1868 as a voluntary association of trade unions. Between 1869 and 1921 the administrative work of the Congress was carried out by the Parliamentary Committee. Since 1921, this work has been carried out by the General Council and by a gradually increasing number of committees including Finance and General Purposes, disputes, Education, Organisations, Social Insurance, International, Economic and Production.

The TUC began depositing its records at the MRC in 1987 and has continued to make regular updates.

The prefixes MSS.292B, 292C and 292D are necessary to identify the records belonging to the 1960-70 TUC archive, the supplement to the 1920-60 archive, and this, the 1970-87 archive.

*See theSee MSS 292 Trades Union Congress Collection in the CASBAH database (ref:MRCA00200) for further details.

Archival history: This collection forms part of the Trades Union Congress Archive (MSS.292) and is the last of four principal deposits by the TUC. It was deposited with the Modern Records Centre in August 1998, when the TUC changed its access policy from closure for thirty years to closure for ten years.

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer:

CONTENT AND STRUCTURE AREA

Scope and content: The collection includes Registry files, principally comprising correspondence, reports, minutes, agreements, background documentation and collected documents, including printed items, 1970 - 1987. Labour problems in post war Britain, racial discrimination, relations with the West Indies, the International British Commonwealth TUC Conferences are some of the issues addressed in the records. Other issues include unauthorised employment, foreign workers, illegal migration, work permits in the hotel industry in particular, required skills for work permits, and the deportation of migrant women workers.

The Home Office, and the Trades Union Congress Hotel and the Catering Committee, the TUC Equal Opportunities committee and the Pakistan Welfare Association are some of the organisations mentioned.

Records of note include:

Labour problems: post-war British (ref: box 386/103 - 107.17, 1970 - 1979). The sub-series of records includes correspondence, reports, articles, and news clippings covering issues such as unauthorised employment, foreign workers, illegal migration, work permits in the hotel industry in particular, illegal workers, skills standards for work permits, and the deportation of migrant women workers. Mention is made of The Home Office, the Trades Union Congress Hotel and the Catering Committee, the TUC Equal Opportunities committee and the Pakistan Welfare association. There are also tables of work permits issued which include people from the Caribbean and Bangladesh.

The series includes a file entitled 'Migrant worker file' (file:103.2) The file covers the work of the International Labour Office detailing the main problems facing foreign workers and the ILO proposals for action. In this series, there are also a number of records of correspondence between various organisations and the Department of Employment regarding the issues surrounding migrant workers.

International British Commonwealth TUC Labour Conferences (ref: MSS.292D box 2357/file 937, 1976 - 1981).

Comprises correspondence, articles, reports, minutes including minutes of the sessions of the Commonwealth Trade Union Council, a memorandum submitted to Commonwealth Employment Labour Ministers entitled' Commonwealth Co-operation: The experience of Organised Labour with special attention to Workers' Education and Training' (1982), and press statements issued from the office of the Commonwealth Secretariat.

The series includes correspondence, articles, reports, minutes. Some of the reports cover activities taking place in the Americas (including the Caribbean). Included in the reports are speeches made at the CTUC yearly conferences. There is also a list of addresses of those who were invited to the 28th Commonwealth Trade Union Conference. (May 1977).

Sociology: People and Human Relations-Colour Problems and Racial Discrimination (Ref: MSS.292D/ Box 1944- 1957/file 805.9-805.93, 1964 - 1979)

Contains correspondence, reports, papers, conference proceedings, speeches, pamphlets, press releases and news clippings. The reports include those from the Select Committee on Race Relations and Immigration and the TUC Equal Opportunities Committee.

Issues covered include housing, welfare, education, employment and discriminatory practices. There are also records of charity organisations involved in anti-discriminatory policy-making and a list of ethnic minority organisations working to address the wide range of issues facing the Black and Asian communities.

There are also records detailing trade unions charged with discriminatory practices and of not representing their members. These records include correspondence, complaint applications and reports on proceedings.

There are also records related to the work of the Community and race relations committee and the TUC work on race relations, the issues facing black and Asian communities, and the policies emanating from government and from the various branches within the TUC.

International/ West Indies (Ref: MSS.292D/ Box 2548 - 2552/file 972-972.9, 1971-1990)

Records Caribbean Congress of Labour Newsletter, Foreign and Commonwealth Office background brief series on various Caribbean states, and records of the Commonwealth Trade Union Council and the International Labour Organisation.

The format includes reports, press releases, newsletters, news clippings, correspondence and pamphlets and includes information on the history of race relations between the TUC and the commonwealth that predates post-war Caribbean migration. Other issues covered in the records include:

Caribbean women trade unionists

Unions in the Caribbean

Life in the Caribbean

General Elections in the Caribbean

Caribbean Educators study visits to the UK

The activities of the West Indian Welfare Trust

Racial discrimination policy in the UK.

Caribbean countries specifically mentions include Bermuda, Bahamas, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Trinidad, Belize, St Vincent and Jamaica.

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling information:

Accruals: This deposit forms part of the Trades Union Congress Archive (MSS.292). Material is being deposited with the Modern Records Centre by the TUC on an on-going basis

System of arrangement: There is a depositor's box list of MSS.292D. The TUC kept its records in a central registry which was developed in the early 1920s. It was during this period that it started to keep detailed subject files. These files record the growth and development of the TUC, its relationship with affiliated unions, government, employers and unions in other countries. They were arranged by subject according to a decimal classification scheme. This scheme forms the basis of the catalogue of the archives :

000-099 : Trade unionism

100-199 : Labour conditions

200-299 : Industrial relations

300-399 : Capitalism

400-499 : Public finance

500-599 : Commerce and economics

600-699 : Industries

700-799 : Politics and government; publicity

800-899 : Social issues

900-999 : International These were further sub-divided into smaller units, e.g. 966 is the classification for West Africa and 966.1 for the Gambia

The Centre's catalogue combines these references with its own prefix, so that a file on the Gambia dating from 1960-5 would become MSS.292B/966.1/1.

The prefix MSS.292B identifies the records as belonging to the 1960-70 archive, records catalogued as MSS.292 belong to the 1920-60 archive and those with the prefix MSS.292D to the most recent 1970-87 deposit. Files with the prefix MSS.292C belong to the supplement to the 1920-60 archive. These files did not originate from the central registry and were deposited at the Centre at a later date than the registry files for the same period.

CONDITIONS OF ACCESS AND USE AREA

Conditions governing access: There are no restrictions on the use of this archive. Personal files are not open for research.

Conditions governing reproduction: @Modern Records Centre. There are no restrictions on the use of this archive, apart from the requirements of copyright law.

Language/scripts of material: English

Physical characteristics:

Finding aids: The finding aid currently constitutes a typescript box-list prepared by the depositor which briefly describes the files contained therein and their dates. To supplement this aid, an interim list has also been compiled which gives references, basic descriptions and dates under general headings. These finding aids are currently only available in paper format in the Centre's searchroom. The Collection is also described on the archiveshub website: http://www.archiveshub.ac.uk/bin/eadsearch2.cgi

ALLIED MATERIALS AREA

Existence and location of originals:

Existence and location of copies: The Parliamentary Committee and General Council minutes, Annual Congress Reports, TUC pamphlets and selected other series of papers are also available in microform.

Related units of description:

Publication note: Ross M. Martin, TUC: The growth of a pressure group 1868-1976 (Oxford, 1980)

DESCRIPTION CONTROL AREA

Recorder's note:

Rules or conventions: Compiled in compliance with General International Standard Archival Description, ISAD(G), second edition, 2000; National Council on Archives Rules for the Construction of Personal, Place and Corporate Names, 1997.

Date(s) of descriptions:

Interest: Caribbean, Black, Asian

Specific group: African-Caribbean peoples; Pakistani peoples

Subjects

Politics

Labour disputes

Labour

Equal opportunity

Immigration

Racial discrimination

Trade unions

Personal/Corporate names

West Indian Welfare Trust

Pakistan Welfare Association

Trades Union Congress

Places

Jamaica

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

Belize

Trinidad and Tobago

Guyana

Grenada

Dominica

Bahamas

Bermuda

Caribbean

United Kingdom