Glasgow's Shipbuilding Legacy Attacked, Cunard dismisses workers as dishonest Options

[Dunvegan]

Anyone who new a Worker at the Yards knew , you could get anything you wanted off them, as has been said their Houses were painted with shipyard paint, they had industrial grade Ships carpets on their floors and as much Wood panelling as you wanted.

Sorry but the stories are true , so why get offended and of course it wasn't just the yards it happened everywhere.

They still built the Best Ships of their time.

I like my father and his father before him, my mother and her sister worked the yards from the 20s to the 90s. never did anything reach our house from any work place. Petty pilfering there may have been but due to the mass of retired detectives and ex coppers employed by Fairfields who scrutinised every one leaving the yard and subjected them to random checks there was little could get by them. Every enterprise has pilfering but to single out a few boasting thieves as being representative of the Glasgow shipyard artisan is thoroughly reprehenisble. Generally these statements seem to come from someone who knew a man whose mate knew had a cousin who boasted to a forth party about how much he had stolen from a nameless source shipyard.

[Dunvegan]

In Post 24 is the old man actually saying his wages at the time of building the QE2 was £2.00 a week??
If so, his memory is letting him down.

As a first year apprentice in Faifields in 1963 my wages were approx. 35 shillings per week.

[Dunvegan]

It wasn't only the shipbuilding industry. I knew a guy whose every stair, lobby or corridor was covered in aircraft carpets; all right if you liked dark blue
One time I contracted at BL when a bunch of their workers were caught building 12 complete Range Rovers at home!
In the aircraft industry you daren't leave your tool box unlocked. You notice a tool gone ... where is it? Nicked? On the aircraft somewhere?
It was dreadful.
One guy came to me; in Holland, from an other hangar to borrow a riveting tool. I had had it specially made for me; a one off, in Sweden. A great tool. Everyone borrowed it. So I gave it to him; about 11am.
After lunch I went to get it back because I needed it and asked a mate which aircraft was the guy (workin') on. He says. "He's on the 12 o' clock to London, mate."
My riveting tool as well.
I worked in Bremen on the Tornado centre-section build when a bunch of Geordie lads got laid off from a shipyard in Hamburg and the agency sent them to work on the aircraft-build with us. Weldin' things down was a waste of time with the Geordies'.
Maybe it is just a British thing: an island monkey thing.

In the joiner's shop in Fairfields we by necessity had to leave our tools lying on benches when we were absent from our station. We also left them in cabins during fitting out. I have never had a tool stolen from me and heard of no case where this occured during my time there.

[Tommy Kennedy]

Well Tommy, as its normally a surreptitious sort of thing to be doing,ie bribing a policeman(and Ive been tested),you must have been very close to the action,or is it hearsay?

Very common, Jupiter, every seaman knew - even if they didn't have 'knocked off ships gear' - they had to put a pound note inisde their I.D. card to hand to the cops on the gate - no quid, there would be a long,long search of your luggage, and you stuff thrown about everywhere - The crews would leave the docks by taxi -soon as the taxi driver saw the cops start a 'search' , they knew how long it was gonna take, would leave the guy, back to ship for another pick up..
(Think - of the crew of a pssenger ship - Queen mary had 2,000 crew!!)

Similar with customs - you left a quid on top of your bunk and if you didn't your smuggled gear cigs, whatever you had stashed - dissapeared. For you that was better than a fine - for the custom guy, he got the gear.

The cops would do even better with the dockers every day - taking pilfered cargo home at end of day.

[Dunvegan]

Having come from a ship building family I can only say that I am sick of these scurrilous remarks, made years after the demise of the shipping industry in Scotland and Glasgow workers in particular. I have outlined what I think of the origins of those slanders in another post. If you can show me how to get a carpet or a mattress of a ship under the scrutiny of the dock security then you are a bit of a magician. Most pilfering occurred after the ships had left the yards and preparing for hand over in another location ie. privately owned dry docks.
The demise of the Glasgow yards may have in part been due to cheap, and might I add shoddy overseas competition, but if jobs were to be sacrificed then Glasgow jobs came before all others.
And to those in this forum who are in hearsay support of these slanders, remember that you are slandering your mates, brothers, sisters aunts, uncles and cousins, because we all had somebody who worked the "yards".

[wellfield]

As a shipyard worker all my life and later to own my own ship repair company,I ken a wee bit about shipyard pilfering,its rampant,but Cunard would have to document the thefts and charges filed to prove their statement......also would like to add to Old Sailor's post regarding the "Queen Mary" saying he has "viewed it from afar"....."Grounded at Long Beach"...."Tourist trap"..."The indignities she suffers sitting there".....Well Sir,with all due respect to your life at sea,I myself have spent all my life in the Maritime trade,my shipfitter's hammer has clanged on the proud metal on the "Queen Mary" have attended many a business meeting in her later years,I was married aboard her in dignity whilst docked in Long Beach...she is docked in a concrete dry-dock..she has just underwent multi-million dollar renovations......Long Beach has no plans of scrapping her (Long Beach newspaper 2011)...she is a hotel,convention centre,museum,she's registered as a historic sight..she's a symbol of Long Beach tourism...and sits there as proud as any Scot,she even hosts her own Highland games every year and every other event you could think of...beautiful bars and multi resturants..New Years Eve celebrations..hardly feats of indignity!...the biggest indignity she could have suffered would have been to be scrapped in the U.K......so she now has 44 years added to her proud life thanks to the people and city of Long Beach! ....as for making profit!...who the hell makes profits these days.....Campbell Tuck

[wellfield]

[Tommy Kennedy]

If you can show me how to get a carpet or a mattress of a ship under the scrutiny of the dock security then you are a bit of a magician. - See My posts, Dunvegan.
The magic you needed was some paper with the Queen's head on it

London/Liverpool/Southmpton docks - I've seen dockies carrying out whole sides of beef/lamb, and frozen at that, actualy using wheel barrows piled with boxes of tinned food.....the ration days that was worth a lot o' money. Cops no problem as long as they got a cut!!!.

PS...I had 10 years before the mast, Dunvegan. Chief Steward on passenger liners - Purser/chief steward on cargo ships.
Of course I never involved myself with such goings on

[wellfield]

This is the forward observation bar aboard the "Queen Mary" as it looks today

[Dunvegan]

If you can show me how to get a carpet or a mattress of a ship under the scrutiny of the dock security then you are a bit of a magician. - See My posts, Dunvegan.
The magic you needed was some paper with the Queen's head on it

London/Liverpool/Southmpton docks - I've seen dockies carrying out whole sides of beef/lamb, and frozen at that, actualy using wheel barrows piled with boxes of tinned food.....the ration days that was worth a lot o' money. Cops no problem as long as they got a cut!!!.

PS...I had 10 years before the mast, Dunvegan. Chief Steward on passenger liners - Purser/chief steward on cargo ships.
Of course I never involved myself with such goings on

Tommy, we were talking about the Clydeside workers who built the ships and I maintain they were not thieves as many are making out. As for crew and after launch activities..... my father was on armed merchant supply ships during WW11 and a bottle of whiskey got him through his home port of Glasgow every time without question.

[Dunvegan]

This is the forward observation bar aboard the "Queen Mary" as it looks today

Too right Wellfield, this was a masterpiece and deserves to be treated as such.

[ionnsaigh]

The Brickie employed,
Tae build a palace,
Disnae expect - tae live there,
Hame tae him, up a back close,
In a rat infested midden.

Maist wurkers wid take pride,
Stawn back an admire yur work,
Tae recognise the aesthetic,
Tae behold yirsel in high esteem,
Extension o you - yur wurk wid seem.

Oan the wan hawn, an oan the other,
Those brothers both, dark and grim,
A hungry Mother, wae two frail wean,
Flea riddin, scabies, nitts an lice,
Trapped an caged, a tenement tramp.

Then the riches, beyond my wildest dreams,
The things a wanted, fur me an ma family,
The reflection distorts - shades - between right and wrong,
Driving a wedge o utter contempt,
Fur the poor. whits new.

[Billyk]

I worked in John Browns Joiner shop prior to QE2 build as an apprentice,( temporary from another yard) as far as thieving was concerned, if you wanted something out of the yard, it went onto 1 of the trucks and was then left at Clydebank railway left luggage, on the other hand the Joiners were also sent to work in the homes of the management, not sure where this was booked to, there is also the point that at the end of an order when there were materials left over from the ship and on inquiring if they could be purchased were told NO they would be incinerated in the boilers, as far as I could could see from my experience in a number of shipyards on the Clyde pilfering/stealing was not rife.

[Tommy Kennedy]

The Brickie employed,
Tae build a palace,
Disnae expect - tae live there,
Hame tae him, up a back close,
In a rat infested midden.

Maist wurkers wid take pride,
Stawn back an admire yur work,
Tae recognise the aesthetic,
Tae behold yirsel in high esteem,
Extension o you - yur wurk wid seem.

Oan the wan hawn, an oan the other,
Those brothers both, dark and grim,
A hungry Mother, wae two frail wean,
Flea riddin, scabies, nitts an lice,
Trapped an caged, a tenement tramp.

Then the riches, beyond my wildest dreams,
The things a wanted, fur me an ma family,
The reflection distorts - shades - between right and wrong,
Driving a wedge o utter contempt,
Fur the poor. whits new.

Aye....the real thieves were the employers at the shipyards - paying wages that barely fed the workers families.
Glaswegians were cheap labour for the Establishment

'In Post 24 is the old man actually saying his wages at the time of building the QE2 was £2.00 a week??
If so, his memory is letting him down.' asks Dunvegan

Poster probably meant building of the 1st Queen Mary.

By the way; oldsailor said it was 1934 when he saw launch of 'Queen Mary'... am sure it was later than that - I was about 5/7 when my Dad took me to watch it.
Mind I believe it was 'laid up' rusting for a long period before being completed

[marcam7]

as one of the joiners who worked on the Q2,sure stuff got nicked,nicking stuff went on in the building trade all the time,there were hundreds of men from "outside"on the ship so it would be par for the course,pretty sure it went on with the yard men to,i worked on the ship to go out before her, a beautiful ship the Kungsholm,it went on there to,but it was pretty small fry in my opinion,remember you had to walk out the gate and there was lots of security,the ingenuityof the guys that went out the gate carrying "homers"had to be seen to believed,i visited a man who had been employed on the ship he showed me his lovely formica topped coffee table that had been smuggled out,i had to inform him it was made from asbestos,and the edges weren't even sealed,i was diagnosed with asbestosis two years ago and now housebound,iv'e also lost two brothers in law with cancer caused by asbestos so there was a price to pay Mr Cunard,ther was nothing romantic about the yards,long long hours, in the winter if it was the early stages it could be hell,my first time in the yards was in 1962 and it was obvious that it was on its lastlegs,no organisation for such a large operation the men knew their jobs so well they got there in spite of the management,the only incentive given was hurry up so we can sack you,how the hell did i stick 45years in that industry