Eric Segal, Kent and East Sussex Socialist Party
Sue Haynes was an outspoken rank-and-file leader of the bitter 1988 P&O strike, which followed on from the 1984-85 miners’ strike. Both strikes opposed the Thatcher Tory government tearing the heart out of working-class communities. Sue was a member of the Militant, forerunner to the Socialist Party.
Sue took the anger of 2,300 Dover P&O workers to the conference of the National Union of Seamen (NUS) in Hull. Sam McCluskey, the right-wing NUS general secretary – and then treasurer of the Labour Party – contemptuously walked out of the conference hall and switched the mike off whilst Sue was calling for the action to be declared a national NUS strike.
During the strike, Sue fought to change the name of the National Union of Seamen to the National Union of Seafarers. Sue was also one of the officers of the Kent Anti-Poll Tax Federation.
She was a class warrior.
