Why the Combine was unable to achieve the implementation of the Lucas Plan
An in-depth analysis of the obstacles faced.
In January 1976 the Secretary of the Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Stewards Committee submitted their Alternative Plan for the Company to Lucas Aerospace management. In the following paragraphs an analysis will be made of the events which unfolded based on available documented evidence which originates from three sources: Correspondence from and to Lucas Management, Hansard and the Diary of Betrayal a CAITS document. The evidence relates to the roles of Lucas Aerospace management, Trade Union Full Time Officers and the Government Department of Industry. The role of Management is shown in the correspondence which was made available to ex Combine members by former Personnel Department staff. Whilst a thorough examination of the correspondence will be made at a later date, for the benefit of this analysis some correspondence will be referred to. As can be expected Management were put on the back foot by the Combine taking the initiative. They were used to the Trade Unions reacting to their decisions! They were confronted with a fifty eight page document outlining the Plan and informed that detailed product information was available to back up the Plan. The Management response was a refusal to meet with the Combine to discuss the Plan, as conveniently, they did not (and because of the Byzantine complexity of the British trade union movement they did not have to) recognise it as an official trade union body. For the full analysis click here
Diary of a Betrayal
Uncovering the hidden alliances against the Lucas Plan.
The Diary of Betrayal is a publication, click here for the full document, which details the events summarised in the Analysis Tab, click here, of this website.
Following the national and international tsunami of support for the Combine and the Lucas Plan, quoting from official letters and documents, the Diary tracks how the Labour government, some national trades union officials and Lucas Aerospace directors formed and unholy alliance to defeat the Combine and the Plan (remembering that the Labour Party National Conference had already adopted unanimously’ support for the Combine and the Plan as Party policy; and that the Combine had done with great effort, what the Government’s secretary of state at the DTI had recommended!). The Diary begins in 1974 and tracks events to approximately 1979.
Democracy versus the Circumlocution Office is a publication by the Institute for Workers’ Control and covers similar territory to the Diary, click here for the full publication. Both publications are fascinating for Lucas Plan enthusiasts. The Circumlocution Office is to be found in Charles Dickens Little Dorritt:-
‘No public business of any kind could possibly be done at any time, without the acquiescence of the Circumlocution Office….if another gunpowder plot had been discovered just half an hour before the lighting of the match, nobody would have been justified in saving the parliament…….unless there had been…half a bushel of minutes, several sacks of official memoranda and a family vault full of ungrammatical correspondence, on the part of the Circumlocution Office.’
Sounds very familiar!
Lowkey, interviews former Combine Chairman, Brian Salisbury:
Lowkey writes: This is Brian Salisbury, one of the brilliant minds behind the Lucas Plan of 1979. You are unlikely to have heard of him or the Lucas Plan, because within it are the seeds of a radically different society. Until recently it seemed the powerful had successfully written him, his colleagues and the alternative their plan represented, out of the history books.
Yesterday, we travelled to his home where he graciously welcomed us and allowed me to interview him for our forthcoming documentary on the British arms trade. In the 1970s arms manufacturer Lucas Aerospace despite receiving millions of pounds in government subsidies was cutting jobs at a fast rate. This led Brian and his colleagues to appeal to Tony Benn for help in November 1974. They agreed on the idea of presenting Lucas Aerospace with a list of 150 socially useful products they could use their expertise and the advanced technology at their fingertips to create, rather than machines that kill people… Click here for the full text.
The above is an extract from a statement made by Lowkey the internationally famous Rapper and Activist following his interview of Brian Salisbury in January 2019.
