Coming out at the TGWU
1988
Coming out at the TGWU
"The one I’m most proud of is coming out
at the Transport and General Workers Union, same thing, Clause 28, and
that’s where it needed saying. A straight woman that was on the NUT
Executive with me in Solihull was part of the Militant Tendency said,
‘Have you heard that the Transport and General have put Clause 28 on
the agenda?' It was an ordinary, straightforward Union meeting, they
have one every six weeks, and they’d put Clause 28 on the agenda and
got nobody to talk on it. She said, ‘I thought I might go. How would you
feel?’ and, of course, I was feeling full of it because I’d done this
other meeting. So I said, ‘Yeah, okay, I’ll do it,’ and so we both went.
I was so nervous, but I said it. All those big blokes and I can assure
you they didn’t come up and congratulate me, they were very polite,
they never heckled me but they didn’t connect. I bet they still don’t
to this day, it wouldn’t occur to them that a bloke in a factory that’s
gay isn’t going to join the T&G because he’s just going to feel
threatened”.
Contributed by: Jean Turley, 72