The Beginning of Labor's End? Britain's “Winter of Discontent†and Working-Class Women's Activism

In the midst of the freezing winter of 1978 and 1979, strikes erupted across Britain. In what became infamously known as the “Winter of Discontent,†workers struck against the Labour Government's attempts to curtail wage increases. The defeat of this “incomes policy†and Labour's subsequent electoral defeat ushered in an era of unprecedented political, economic, and social change for Britain. Conservative victory, under the leadership of Margaret Thatcher, not only seemed to signal the dissolution of “traditional†working-class ties to the Labour Party, it also suggested that British working-class politics might finally be on its last leg. Furthermore, a potent social myth developed around the Winter of Discontent, one where “bloody-minded†workers brought down a sympathetic government and “invited†the ravages of Thatcherism upon the British labor movement. Absent from these various narratives are the experiences of rank-and-file activists, in particular, the growing number of female trade unionists active in these strikes. This article examines the experiences of a group of women trade unionists from the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) who participated in the strikes of the Winter of Discontent. Based on oral histories and corresponding archival material, it argues that the Winter of Discontent provided a crucial “rite of passage†for these women, one which exposed them to an unprecedented level of involvement in grassroots labor activism and leadership. Thereafter, these working-class women began to make significant inroads into NUPE and the Labour Party, which helped to make working women's issues more central to the British labor movement for decades to come. Therefore, rather than being the death knell of British working-class politics, this study of women involved in the Winter of Discontent strikes reveals that while one form of working-class politics was in decline, a reconfigured one was in the process of being born.