Liverpool: a cry for help

Eric Heffer

The horrific word-picture of Liverpool, painted by Richard West in Paddy's other island' (2 April), as a city occupied by

a bunch of dead-beats is outrageous and untrue. That the city is run-down, that its port is in serious trouble, that unemploy- ment if rife and that people suffer the agonies portrayed in Bleasdale's TV series,

Boys from the Black Stuff, is all too true,

but the reasons for the decline are not those given by West. They can be better found in

the recent book Bias to the Poor by Liver- pool's Anglican Bishop, David Sheppard, who has a real understanding of what is wrong and what needs to be done.

West writes with a distaste and misunderstanding of Liverpudlians which makes me angry and sad. They are not skinheads who regularly indulge in punch- ups. For instance, his reference to Liver- pool football fans is sheer fantasy. Does he not know that Liverpool and Everton have their local derby games without trouble? That when the teams are playing away their fans do not get involved in violence?

West trots out the hoary old story that Liverpool dockers are strike-prone and generally bloody-minded. The truth is, Liverpool's dockers and Liverpool workers in general are no more strike-prone than any other workers.

What West mistakes for bloodyminded- ness is really something quite different. It is a compassion for and solidarity with others.

For instance, when I worked on the con- struction sites and in the shipbuilding and repair yards on Merseyside, my fellow- joiners would never accept individual bonus schemes, although they were keen to earn bonuses. They argued that old Fred Jones aged 62 was just as important as a younger man and should get the same money at the end of the week, even though he was no longer as agile and fast a workman as he had been in his younger days. And when a worker was killed as a result of an accident at work the men would stop work for that day out of respect, with loss of pay, and at the end of the week on pay-day would give generously to a collection for their mate's dependants.

One of the longest strikes in which Liver- pool dockers were involved was in support of Canadian seamen just after the war. The men did not strike immediately, but refused to work on the Canadian ship. They were forced to take strike action when a group of dockers were dismissed because of their refusal.

Liverpool dockers in the past were treated like cattle. They had to line up in areas the men called 'pens' and wait to be inspected and picked out by the foreman for a job. Even we tradesmen, joiners and others, had to take our tools down to ship repair firms' stands' at 7.30 in the morning and wait to be selected or rejected for casual work. This practice continued until the workers, through their trade unions, brought it to an end. Richard West has no experience or even understanding of such things, nor has he had the experience of go- ing to the toilet in a shipyard such as Cam- mell Lairds in the old days and being dock- ed money for taking longer than the few allotted minutes. Like many of his kind Mr West does not know he is born.

Liverpool's port, like that of Glasgow, Bristol and those of South Wales, has declined for a number of reasons, the basic one being that since Britain entered the European Common Market it is on the wrong side of the country. The facts are in- disputable and have nothing to do with the Liverpool Irish.

Unemployment in Liverpool is not caused by 'human folly' and 'wickedness', nor is Liverpool a 'dump' as West suggests. For example, Tate and Lyle in Liverpool closed down because of the change from cane sugar to beet due to our membership of the Common Market. The docks, like London's docks, because of containerisa- tion and entry to the EEC, declined. Cam- mell Lairds has shrunk, as have all British shipyards, and Liverpool seamen are out of work because passenger liners have been superseded by the airlines. Those passenger ships that do come to Britain go to ports nearer the Continent. As a result, all the firms connected with the port have been badly affected by the change in trade pat- terns and also by the technological developments in shipping. Clearly, Richard West does not understand the ABC of in- dustrial life on Merseyside, which was over- whelmingly geared to the ports. It was 'Sorry, I've been positively vetted.' Labour governments and Labour councils who tried to diversify over the years by making Merseyside a Special Development Area and giving aids to industry to attract companies to the area. Some of us did warn at the time that entry to the EEC would lead to a bleak future for Merseyside. This has indeed proved to be the case, with firms like Dunlops, Courtaulds, Meccano and Bowyers closing down. Only this last week yet another firm, Krafts, has announced at least 900 redundancies because 'it is too far from the centre of Europe'.

It is, however, West's snide remarks about the Irish that I find most objec- tionable. Perhaps he is not aware that dur- ing the second world war Liverpool was very heavily bombed, but this fact was given little publicity because the authorities did not want the enemy to be aware of the damage that had been done to the port. The Liverpool people responded magnificently to these trials. Does he also not know of the contribution that the Southern Irish made in the war, with thousands coming over to serve with the British armed forces?

Liverpool is justly proud of its Irish con- nections, whether North or South. But the Irish are only a part of Liverpool's fabric. There is an added mixture of Welsh, Lan- castrians, Scots, Chinese and West Indians- And because of this cultural mix, Liverpool over the years has contributed to the arts possibly more than any other city. One only has to think of talented entertainers, artists, playwrights, poets and musicians like Ar- thur Askey, Ted Ray, Rob Wilton, TommY Handley, the Beatles, the Liverpool Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Arthur Dooley, Roger McGough, Alan Bleasedale and Wil- ly Russell, to grasp the point.

One of the great problems of Liverpool is

that it was carved up by the planners, a sub- ject I wrote about in this journal manY years ago. The planners 'kidded' the local councillors into tearing the city's heart out, and breaking up the security of the old communities. That unsettled the people, who responded for a time by electing Liberal 'pavement politicians'. The sound, sensible policies of the late Jack Braddock were replaced by the gimmicky ideas and plans of Sir Trevor Jones. But to be fair, even they are not responsible for all of Liverpool's ills. The problem goes deeper than that: old industries have died; The Empire is dead; we have turned away from the Commonwealth to the EEC. So the shipbuilding and ship-repair industries are

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badly affected, the modern container Pori; is under-used, despite the co-operation or. the dock workers — and all the Goverri a ment does is to send a Minister to do cosmetic job instead of laying long-teral plans and putting in real government invest- ment. It is no wonder the people of Liverpool, are bitter and in despair. These people need help, not abuse. They are a good work force, as any long-time Liverpool empio apnraisegdo , will tell you. Their compassion, decency d ocinoht humour be valued and