Exhibition marks South Asian women's involement in industrial strikes in London

Published: 8:00 AM October 7, 2009 Updated: 8:15 AM October 14, 2020

THIRTY years of South Asian women s involvement in industrial disputes in London is being depicted in an exhibition opening this week in the East End. Striking Women being shown at the Women s Library, part of the London Metropolitan University, in Old Ca

THIRTY years of South Asian women's involvement in industrial disputes in London is being depicted in an exhibition opening this week in the East End.

Striking Women being shown at the Women's Library, part of the London Metropolitan University, in Old Castle Street, Aldgate, will celebrate the role played by South Asian women in workplace struggles in Greater London.

It will focus on two industrial disputes-the strike at Grunwick between 1976 and 1978 and the dispute at Gate Gourmet that erupted in 2005.

On a hot August afternoon in 1976, a small number of workers walked out of a photo-processing laboratory in Willesden, marking the beginning a two year strike, now seen as a key events in trade union history. Twenty-nine years later another group of workers-this time assembling airline meals-left their posts, starting a lock out at Gate Gourmet, causing disruption at Heathrow.

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Through images, text and interviews, the exhibition puts these two disputes in the wider context of South Asian women's fight for better working conditions and wages, and explores the similarities and differences between the two disputes.

The exhibition will run from October 8 to March next year. Exhibition opening times are 9.30am-5.30pm.