Explore all stories - TUC 150 Stories

Dagenham Women’s Strike

How Ford’s striking women drove the Equal Pay Act

Miner, socialist, pacifist, leader

Health and Safety

Making London the safest Olympics ever

Ricky Tomlinson

“My innocence has been proved time and again”

Dorothy Ratcliffe and Susan Crosby

Equal pay in Yorkshire school canteens

Mary Bamber and Bessie Braddock

Like mother, like daughter

The Wapping Dispute

Clementina Black

Trade union leader and all-round firebrand

Health and Safety

Samuel Plimsoll

The sailors' hero

Demanding a minimum wage

Health and Safety

Health and Safety Act 1974

Disabled workers

National League of the Blind

"Justice not Charity"

Taking on the print barons

Low Pay Commission

"A burning sense of what was just"

Global Solidarity

Supporting Polish trade unionists

Bringing socialism to Liverpool

Keeping the family together

7 things you should know

The Woolf’s Strike

Organising migrant workers

10 things you need to know

Oliver Kilbourn

The Pitmen Painters

Best foot forward – from redundancy to a shoe business

Global Solidarity

The 1889 London dockworkers’ strike

Five steps to success

84 years of activism

Costing workers their jobs and their families

Eyewitness to Cable Street

The weavers strike

Success for the first all-woman strike committee

Disabled workers

Creating the right balance for work and family life

The real-life hero from Pride

Apprenticeships

Championing Young Workers

Margaret Bondfield

Shop floor rebel

Fighting back against sexual harassment

Let Robeson Sing

Chris Braithwaite

Sailor, docker and activist

Global Solidarity

Hans Gottfurcht

How the TUC helped to keep European unionism alive during WWII

"We are those lions, Mr Manager.”

A beacon of hope at GCHQ

Trade unions during WWII

Building relationships and boosting morale

Burston School Strike

The longest strike in history

Match Women’s Strike

Global Solidarity

G.H. Stuart-Bunning

The International Labour Organisation

The first female president of the TUC

“Let’s open up the world and bring light and knowledge in”

The Tolpuddle Martyrs

Greater Manchester

Kevin Horne and Barbara Jackson

“I ran for my life through a field, horses chasing me.”

The Jarrow March

Demanding a new deal

Fighting wage slavery

The great Penrhyn quarry strike

Capturing the public imagination

The Trico strike for equal pay

Thirty years to equality at work

Founder of the NHS

Revolutionary Rosie

Mass Strike in Dublin 1913

Health and Safety

Joint Production Committees

Protecting workers

Ending discrimination on the buses

Everyday Heroes

Poet, socialist and trade union leader

The founding of the TUC

150 years on and going strong

Playing a blinder for women

Campaigning for recognition

Saving Steel Workers' Pensions

Pioneering trade unionist and suffragette

"We knew we had to set up our own union"

Bristol bus boycott

Bristol’s forgotten civil rights scandal

Memories of the general strike

The man who redefined the TUC

Everyday Heroes

Order of Industrial Heroism

Celebrating working heroes

The pioneer behind 30 women’s trade unions

“The classes are a great networking event.”

“A union is about being united and working together”

Wasting no time to build a movement

Helping girls plan for life after football

Health and Safety

“We’ll never know how many lives we’ve saved”

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Health and Safety

Janise Corsfield

“I’ve always been safety conscious”

Gail Cartwright, Midwife

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Alisdair Kairns

Not all glitz and glamour at the movies

Evelyn Martin MBE

A lifetime of learning

Galvanising a community in times of strife

Galvanising a community in times of strife

Five ways my union supported my transition

When we ‘do the business’ for our members, we can build a stronger union

Millie Apedo-Amah

The vital role of a train guard

Five things I learnt from being a union member

“It’s been a sacrifice but it was worth it”

Why I came out as gay at a school assembly

Yorkshire and Humber

Jake O’Malley

Three steps to building a strong union

Show the love – hug your school!

Anne Cox, headteacher

“An outstanding trade unionist”

We turned something negative into something really positive

Canon Steven Saxby

Five reasons why faith workers need unions

Disabled workers

Changing the narrative

Charlotte Gardner

Leading a network of 50 reps

Dudley Hackling

‘It all comes down to communication and confidence’

Squeezing our public service professionals

“It’s a privilege to be involved with trade unions”

"Without my union, I wouldn't have survived"

Musician's Union

Four reasons why musicians need unions

Firefighter and FBU official

Booking in time to destress

Queueing up to learn

Fighting for permanent contracts

Royal College of Midwives

Jillian Ireland and Sara Fripp

Singing it loud

Satnam Singh Ner

Bringing diversity into the workplace

A young postie with a passion for fairness

5 reasons for musicians to join a union

Supporting women survivors of violence

Health and Safety

Alan Knight MBE

“I want to make sure young footballers don’t go through what I had to”

Global Solidarity

From the college canteen to international leadership

Building a culture of learning – at every level and background

People don’t say no enough

Fighting for change at McDonalds

“Actors have always been part of the gig economy”

A no-nonsense approach on the shop floor

Yorkshire and Humber

Lisa Greenfield

“People always want to learn”

“A 200-word essay changed my life”

Winning for care workers on zero-hours

Craig Johnstone

The Churchill Cleaners: five tips to winning a dispute

Health and Safety

60 seconds at Sellafield

Changing the conversation about mental health at work

Pauline Carwood

"30 years ago women didn't drive trains"

Knocking on every door

Public Services

Deborah Bell and Karen McArthur

The faces behind library losses

Angela Rayner MP

A remarkable journey to Westminster

Many routes to an education

Health and Safety

60 seconds on a North Sea rig

Barry Downey, Firefighter

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Apprenticeships

“An apprenticeship was a no-brainer”

Cricket ball makers strike

Small but mighty

People’s March for Jobs

Albert Mansbridge

Championing education for working people

“Journalism was suddenly being equated with espionage”

Fiercely intelligent, influential and inspirational

The home of the British trade union movement

Campaigning for paid holiday for everyone

14 stories

Fighting for the future

4 stories

Disabled Workers

Challenging stereotypes

9 stories

Fighting for racial equality

6 stories

A new deal for working people

Trade unionists demanding change

9 stories

International Women’s Day

Women trade unionists winning equal pay

4 stories

End the public sector pay squeeze

Public sector workers explain the impact of pay cuts

7 stories

100 years of suffrage

Women trade unionists fighting for equality

11 stories

Building safer workplaces

Protecting workers' health and safety

8 stories

Learning with your union

Because everyone has the right to an education

7 stories

Celebrating the work of reps and members

14 stories

Working peoples' last resort