The Cine Technician (1953-1956)

March-April, 1953 THE CINE-TECHNICIAN 47 ERIC PASK does not think that it needs showmanship to be a good Union member — even in the entertainment industry. He himself does not like the limelight, and he attacks the insincerity of those people who are all talk. The facts that he was born among miners in Newport, Monmouthshire, in 1908, that his father was Father of the Chapel (Shop Steward in the printing trade) for twenty years, and that he has experienced the differences of working for nonunion and Union firms have given Eric Pask his unshakably positive views. Leaving school at 16, he became an apprentice in still photography in London, learning all sides of the trade, and learning, too, at the time of the General Strike, what it was like to be in a trade where there was no Union. But at 21 he left and became a stock joiner in the printing room at Kay, Finsbury Park, Labs. This was before ACT'S time, and his wages were 35/ a week; there was no extra pay for night work; overtime, to which there was no limit, was only paid at time and a quarter; the day shift in the printing room was from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., the night shift from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.; the Friday evening shift extended to mid-day Saturday without overtime payment. Eric joined ACT in 1938, and after a meeting that Bert Craik and Frank Fuller addressed in a nearby pub, there were thirty members at Kay, Finsbury Park. Jack Foot was elected Steward and Eric was his deputy until Jack left and Eric took over. With people like Joe Underwood and Jack Batt — still with Kay's — they got the place organised; but when the war started in 1939, there was a clear out at Kay's and Eric suffered six months' unemployment. Conditions at George Humphries Labs were better, although he found that Saturday afternoon overtime was compulsory. Eric comments that he has always been against this — " overtime should always be voluntary." There were only about sixty ACT members at Humphries then, and after three months Eric was on the Committee there, helping to build up the membership to the 150 or so it was when he left. Soon he was elected Steward in place of Arthur Williams, and with Joe Bremson he became the Cine Profiles The third of 'Recorder's' short biographies of men and women active in A.C.T. Humphries representative on the Lab Committee. Eric never forced his ideas down people's throats — persuasion, not dictatorship, has been his method, all the while looking after those not so capable of doing so themselves. And so it was that when the famous Humphries dispute of 1945 came, 26 members were locked out, while the remainder blacklegged; the loyal 26 included Eric himself, Frances Dobbs, Joe Bremson, Lee Piatt and Bert Highet amongst other committee members. For thirteen weeks all sections of ACT rallied to their aid, and the company was defeated. Those who had remained at work learned a lesson from this, and when a secret ballot was taken on whether the closed shop should apply at Humphries, they voted overwhelmingly for it. Eric, who was now on the General Council as a lab member, left in December 1946 to join documentaries, and is now in the Cutting Rooms at Data. For eight years he has served on the Committee of the Westminster Branch — the last four as its Secretary — as well as on the Shorts Committee since it started. Having been through the mill, his views are very decided; some ACT members, he considers, divorce " the Union " from themselves and think they can leave the winning of improvements to others; only when the members themselves have got agreement from the employers, can the administration be left to " the Union." ACT, he believes, should be confined to those without the rights of hire and fire, and should not include people such as Producers and Production Managers. "They can't help their attitude, as their object is always to reduce costs." They are too close to the employer mentality of cutting wages before overheads — and it is for that very reason that Trades Unions are needed most. So many employer-members are in the Union that members become scared of taking action — it's usually left to the lab members to pull the chestnuts out of the fire — and as a result ACT often becomes afraid of itself, and is reluctant to call the bluff of the employers. That's why Eric Pask attacks insincerity — particularly the insincerity of those who often talk the most.