Oxford Facing Stoppage

Oxford Facing Stoppage
FROM OUR CORRESPONDENT
OXFORD, MAY 22

All car assembly at Morris Motors, Oxford, will be brought to a standstill by Thursday morning, and more than 3,000 workers made idle, unless the electricians' strike at the British Motor Corporation's tractor and transmissions branch at Birmingham is settled.

When they finish work this afternoon 1,700 men at Cowley will be laid off indefinitely. They are workers on the Morris Oxford, Wolseley, Riley, and M.G.A. range, on the Wolseley 6/110 and on the Mini-Minor day shift. Another 350 Mini-Minor workers will finish at the end of the night shift tonight. A B.M.C. spokesman said this afternoon that unless work is resumed at the tractor and transmissions branch, production of the Morris Minor 1000 at Cowley will stop after tomorrow's night shift.

"This will mean that there will be no assembly work at Morris Motors ", the spokesman said.

When production of the Morris Minor 1000 ends, 3,350 workers at Cowley will be idle. " This number will be increased later in the week as more people's jobs become affected ", he said.

The go-slow by between 600 and 700 workers at the neighbouring stores, B.M.C. Service, Ltd., Oxford, in support of a wage claim will continue, the men decided at a meeting today.

10,000 Idle Car Workers
From Our Correspondent
BIRMINGHAM, MAY 22
The strike of 55 electricians at the British Motor Corporation tractor and transmissions factory, which has already halted car production at the Austin factory at Longbridge, continued today and its effect spread to B.M.C.'s other main assembly plant, Morris Motors at Oxford. By Thursday morning-unless there is a settlement-there will be no car production at either the Austin or the Morris factories, and at least 10,000 workers will be idle.

Car production at the Austin works ended when the night shift finished this morning, and 4,600 men were laid off. The number will rise to over 5,000 tomorrow when 500 on engine production stop work.

At the tractor and transmissions factory the number idle rose during the day to 1,900, with another 650 workers being sent home because there was no work for them.

BETTER OFFER WANTED
The tractor and transmissions factory supplies suspension units and rear axles for all B.M.C.. car models and some commercial vehicles. The electricians' strike began last week after they had failed to reach agreement with the management over a pay claim, and on Thursday 265 machine operators walked out of the factory after refusing to operate machines normally repaired by the striking electricians. There seems little hope of an early end to the dispute. The electricians met today and decided to continue their strike and later Mr J. T. Bolas, area secretary of the Electrical Trades Union, which has recognized the strike as official, said there was no possibility of a return to work until the company improved their offer.

The two unofficial strikes at Nuffield Metal Products, a B.M.C. subsidiary in Birmingham. ended today. The 200 press shop workers, who went on strike last week over piecework rates and waiting time payments, reported back for work, and so did the 30 storehands and six internal transport drivers who stopped work yesterday.

Three new appointments to the board of directors have been announced by Standard-Triumph International.
These concern Mr L. A. Woodall, who also continues as a director of certain other subsidiaries in the group, Mr G. H. Turnbull, who, is general manager of production at the Coventry factories, and Mr H. G. Webster, chief engineer.