The Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Stewards' Committee

Tributes and Updates

A New Lucas Plan: An Idea Whose Time Has Come

The Lucas Plan, has remained as a grassroots model for many similar initiatives since it was launched in 1976. Being as relevant today as it was when first developed by the Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Stewards Committee. The aim of this website is to encourage other workers and community organisations to follow in the footsteps of the Combine shop stewards and produce Plans which are an alternative to the mainstream neoliberal policies which currently are having a detrimental effect on working class people’s standard of living and the environment, and fight for their implementation.

Increased militarism is accelerating the world wide arms race, encouraging conflict between nations at a time when environmental degradation cry’s out for worldwide cooperation to tackle fossil fuel created climate change. While the introduction of Artificial Intelligence (AI) will bring about fundamental negative changes within the workplace and the community as a whole, given that there’s no indication of its introduction being regulated by the UK government. 

Large corporations influence and control government policies and the fact that fossil fuel and the armament industries generate huge profits, the corporations have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo. AI, which is already in the hands of big tech companies makes it less likely to be used for socially useful reasons. 

Only “bottom up” resistance and the pursuance of an alternative economic and social approach from trade unionists and community grass root organisations to counter neoliberalism, will bring about beneficial change for working class people.

That’s why detailed information of the Lucas Plan , from those former Combine shop stewards who were involved, has been made available on this website to act as a guide.
 
Below, are events and initiatives, relating to the Combines Lucas Plan model, that have already occurred or are now taking place.
 
 * In 2015, film maker and activist Steve Sprung produced a film THE PLAN – that came from the bottom up. The film which told the story of The Lucas Plan within the context of wider political events and the environment, involved the active participation of surviving Lucas Aerospace Combine shop stewards. An indication of the film’s significance was it being selected to be shown at the British Film Industry Festival in 2017. It has been viewed numerous times, nationally and internationally, since its BFI showing. 
 
* In 2016 a CONFERENCE was held in Birmingham to 
commemorate the 40th anniversary of the launching of the Lucas Plan. As a result of the conference the New Lucas Plan group was formed to work in conjunction
with trade union organised workers and community groups to encourage the development and implementation of grassroots  alternative plans. 
 
* The production of the film and the holding of the conference brought together the then retired Combine shop stewards, meeting each other for the first time in decades.
Coming together again, led to regular meetings taking place, mainly by Zoom, and a decision was made to create a WEBSITE to communicate what they’d experienced as Combine shop stewards and what it meant to develop and try to implement the Lucas Plan. In digitally communicating their experiences, the ex shop stewards aimed too encourage other workers and community groups to follow in their footsteps and create their own plans.
 
*  Adrian Smith as Professor of Technology and Society of the Policy Research Unit based in the University of Sussex Business School has been a long standing supporter of the Combine’s Lucas Plan and in the recent past included details of the Plan in students course material and also organised a Socially Useful Production Conference which again featured the Lucas Plan. More recently Professor Smith contributed to a Grassroots Innovation Movements Open Access Book with a chapter titled Socially Useful Production and a journal article which featured the Lucas Plan.
 
* At the height of the Pandemic the government launched VentilatorChallengeUK to industry, calling for manufacturers to switch production to makeup for the shortfall of ventilators needed by NHS staff to treat badly affected Covid patients. Aerobus management and UNITE organised workers responded positively and operated a three shift system to produce 15000 units in 12 weeks, proving that workers can make the transition from manufacturing aerospace wings to much needed socially useful medical equipment.
 
* John Routley the former Combine shop stewards contributed to the COP26 Conference in Glasgow in 2021. John’s contribution to “COP26. Organising for a fair hospitality city” is one of many contributions made by former Combine shop stewards to the the ongoing debate on the Climate Crisis.
 
* Nora Rathzel the Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the Department of Sociology of Umea University has undertaken a series of courses in Worker led Conversion in a number of locations in the UK and abroad. The courses, which involved participants from many employment  sectors, included the Lucas Plan experience. Phil Asquith, the former Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Steward, helped shape and contributed to the course.
 
* Grace Blakeley, the political and economic commentator, journalist and author, has exposed in her book Vulture Capitalism, how the world’s most powerful corporations exert their influence on every day living and identified late-stage capitalism as the reason for our modern day crisis. As a response to late-stage capitalism, Grace wrote a chapter 8 titled The Architect and the Bee: How to Plan Democratically, in which she stated :-
“The Lucas Plan was an extraordinary ambitious document which challenged the foundations of capitalism. In place of an institution designed to generate profit via the domination of labour by capital, the workers at Lucas Aerospace had developed a new model for the firm: one based on the democratic production of socially useful commodities. It was almost as if the workers had never needed managing at all; as though they were creative architects rather than obedient bees”
 
* Laid off workers at the former GKN factory near Florence Italy have occupied the factory for over 900 days. With the support of the local community they aim to raise €1m by selling shares to purchase the factory and capitalise a cooperative they intend to establish. As of January 2024 they have received €600k from individuals, community organisations, cooperatives and fellow trade unionists in Italy and abroad. Their intention is to switch manufacture from automotive components to the more socially useful solar panels and cargo bikes. 
The Communist Refoundation Party stated:  “Braving the Draghi-Meloni government and the Tuscany regional administration, the GKN Florence Workers-Factory Collective has elaborated an industrial project for a socially integrated plant, based on cooperation, mutualisation, public capital and with production available for the ecological transition from the bottom up”
 
* Truth to Power Interview of Roger Waters of Pink Floyd fame by Lowkey. In a wide ranging interview, reference is made to the Lucas Plan and Steve Sprung film.
 
* Community theatre group Banner interviews with Phil Asquith and Brian Salisbury, with regard to their involvement in the Combine and Lucas Plan. The theatre group will be performing the results of the interviews at trade union branches.
 
* Laura Flanders and Friends which is a US wide television programme, will feature interviews held with Phil Asquith and Brian Salisbury with regard to the part they played in the Combine and the Lucas Plan campaign.
 
* Phil Asquith participated in An oral history of the Environmental Movement in the UK 1970 – 2020 research project carried out jointly by The British Library and the Royal Holloway University of London. The aim is to create a national archive of oral interviews with activists involved in protests, policies and practical action over the last 50 years to inspire and inform citizens and future generations interested in protecting the environment.

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.

Watch the Interview

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AN ALTERNATIVE PLAN

Using resources and technology that is people centred and respects the environment by Brian Salisbury, January 2022, former Lucas Aerospace Combine Chairman.

ABSTRACT:- For the complete paper click here

The following statement was compiled by former Lucas Aerospace Combine shop stewards. We are proposing that an Alternative Plan for the UK is developed by a combination of peace and environmental groups and trade unionists that has socially useful production at its core, is people-centred and in tune with the environment. We put forward this proposal based on the belief that the above groups are opposed to the Government using technology to manufacture armaments that threaten life at home and abroad. We realise that such an initiative will require the organisations involved to step up their current campaigning work by combining together; then develop and promote a vision of a future U.K. which would include the necessary measures to address the climate crisis.

We believe that the considerable experience and expertise that exist in the above groups and the trade unions, qualifies them to produce such a plan.

Most if not all of the groups referred to are aware of and support the Lucas Aerospace workers efforts in the 1970’s to oppose job loss by developing an alternative corporate plan, which not only proposed their company manufacturing socially useful and environmentally sustainable products but identified the process of how the plan was developed, with workers, the community and academics collaborating. This resulted in championing a worker/consumer led alternative industrial culture; not only proposing alternative products but less alienating ways of producing them that empowered designers, engineers and shop floor workers.

It advocated a circular economy that encouraged re-cycling and repair and long- term sustainability in everything rather than the short-term throw away culture that a system built on continual growth and private profit breeds.

We are of the opinion that the proposed plan for the U.K. should be based on the same principles.

The statement’s aim is to highlight the government’s lack of urgency in tackling the climate crisis and its policy of pursuing confrontation with nations rather than cooperation, resulting in the ever increasing manufacture and export of armaments. It highlights the financial and human cost of the Arms Industry (2&3) and the means by which Transition (4) can take place allowing the workers to switch to socially useful production.

Reference is made to the Government’s inadequate response to the Climate Crisis (5&6) and the failure of COP26 (7) to deliver – whilst Pandemics (9) are best prevented rather than cured! It’s proposed that the Alternative Plan (8) has the Socially Useful (10) use of technology at its core and would be best developed in a Centre (11).

While emphasis is centred on the arms industry, the same philosophy can be equally applied to other sectors of the economy.

We consider that a Plan for the U.K. that tackles the climate crisis with peace and justice at its core is people centred and in tune with the environment, is in line with public opinion and therefore would get their support.

For the complete paper click here

Tributes

This website is dedicated to all of the Lucas Aerospace Combine Shop Stewards and the workforce. Without their full involvement and the sharing of their skill and expertise the Lucas Plan would never have been developed and promoted. It’s sad to say that many of those Combine shop stewards are now no longer with us. The following are those we know of and who are very much missed.

Mike Cooley, Ernie Scarbrow, Danny Conroy, Ron Mills, John Routley and Mike George (CAITS)

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