Explore all stories - TUC 150 Stories

The real-life hero from Pride

Dorothy Ratcliffe and Susan Crosby

Equal pay in Yorkshire school canteens

Ending discrimination on the buses

Disabled workers

National League of the Blind

"Justice not Charity"

Best foot forward – from redundancy to a shoe business

Memories of the general strike

Match Women’s Strike

10 things you need to know

Ricky Tomlinson

“My innocence has been proved time and again”

Trade unions during WWII

Building relationships and boosting morale

Low Pay Commission

The Jarrow March

Demanding a new deal

Let Robeson Sing

The Wapping Dispute

Greater Manchester

Bristol bus boycott

Bristol’s forgotten civil rights scandal

Chris Braithwaite

Sailor, docker and activist

Fighting back against sexual harassment

Demanding a minimum wage

Margaret Bondfield

Shop floor rebel

"We are those lions, Mr Manager.”

"A burning sense of what was just"

A beacon of hope at GCHQ

Pioneering trade unionist and suffragette

The great Penrhyn quarry strike

Capturing the public imagination

The Tolpuddle Martyrs

Health and Safety

Samuel Plimsoll

The sailors' hero

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

Health and Safety

Health and Safety Act 1974

Trade union leader and all-round firebrand

The weavers strike

Success for the first all-woman strike committee

Playing a blinder for women

Keeping the family together

Eyewitness to Cable Street

The founding of the TUC

150 years on and going strong

Mary Bamber and Bessie Braddock

Like mother, like daughter

The man who redefined the TUC

Kevin Horne and Barbara Jackson

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

Saving Steel Workers' Pensions

Apprenticeships

Championing Young Workers

The pioneer behind 30 women’s trade unions

Bringing socialism to Liverpool

Disabled workers

Creating the right balance for work and family life

Burston School Strike

The longest strike in history

Miner, socialist, pacifist, leader

7 things you should know

Costing workers their jobs and their families

Health and Safety

Making London the safest Olympics ever

Health and Safety

Joint Production Committees

Protecting workers

Oliver Kilbourn

The Pitmen Painters

Campaigning for recognition

Clementina Black

Global Solidarity

G.H. Stuart-Bunning

The International Labour Organisation

Everyday Heroes

Poet, socialist and trade union leader

Everyday Heroes

Order of Industrial Heroism

Celebrating working heroes

Dagenham Women’s Strike

How Ford’s striking women drove the Equal Pay Act

Revolutionary Rosie

Mass Strike in Dublin 1913

84 years of activism

The Woolf’s Strike

Organising migrant workers

Thirty years to equality at work

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

Taking on the print barons

The first female president of the TUC

Global Solidarity

Supporting Polish trade unionists

Global Solidarity

Hans Gottfurcht

How the TUC helped to keep European unionism alive during WWII

Fighting wage slavery

Global Solidarity

The 1889 London dockworkers’ strike

Five steps to success

The Trico strike for equal pay

Founder of the NHS

Building a culture of learning – at every level and background

A no-nonsense approach on the shop floor

Firefighter and FBU official

Global Solidarity

From the college canteen to international leadership

Changing the conversation about mental health at work

Five ways my union supported my transition

Five things I learnt from being a union member

Alisdair Kairns

Not all glitz and glamour at the movies

Apprenticeships

“An apprenticeship was a no-brainer”

Pauline Carwood

"30 years ago women didn't drive trains"

Why I came out as gay at a school assembly

“A 200-word essay changed my life”

Squeezing our public service professionals

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

Angela Rayner MP

A remarkable journey to Westminster

5 reasons for musicians to join a union

A young postie with a passion for fairness

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

Gail Cartwright, Midwife

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Canon Steven Saxby

Five reasons why faith workers need unions

Health and Safety

60 seconds at Sellafield

Supporting women survivors of violence

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

Barry Downey, Firefighter

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Musician's Union

Four reasons why musicians need unions

Booking in time to destress

People don’t say no enough

Public Services

Deborah Bell and Karen McArthur

The faces behind library losses

Fighting for permanent contracts

Galvanising a community in times of strife

Royal College of Midwives

Jillian Ireland and Sara Fripp

Singing it loud

Yorkshire and Humber

Lisa Greenfield

“People always want to learn”

Satnam Singh Ner

Bringing diversity into the workplace

Health and Safety

60 seconds on a North Sea rig

Health and Safety

Alan Knight MBE

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

Evelyn Martin MBE

A lifetime of learning

Show the love – hug your school!

Anne Cox, headteacher

Fighting for change at McDonalds

“The classes are a great networking event.”

Millie Apedo-Amah

The vital role of a train guard

Charlotte Gardner

Leading a network of 50 reps

“Actors have always been part of the gig economy”

Knocking on every door

Wasting no time to build a movement

Craig Johnstone

The Churchill Cleaners: five tips to winning a dispute

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

We turned something negative into something really positive

“An outstanding trade unionist”

Health and Safety

Janise Corsfield

“I’ve always been safety conscious”

Yorkshire and Humber

Jake O’Malley

Three steps to building a strong union

Helping girls plan for life after football

Galvanising a community in times of strife

Dudley Hackling

‘It all comes down to communication and confidence’

Queueing up to learn

Health and Safety

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

Many routes to an education

“A union is about being united and working together”

Disabled workers

Changing the narrative

Squeezing our public sector professionals

Winning for care workers on zero-hours

People’s March for Jobs

“Journalism was suddenly being equated with espionage”

Campaigning for paid holiday for everyone

Fiercely intelligent, influential and inspirational

Cricket ball makers strike

Small but mighty

The home of the British trade union movement

Albert Mansbridge

Championing education for working people

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