David’s name is probably not known to most Groby people, so why is the leader of the Labour Party writing to someone in the Tory heartland of the Charnwood constituency? To answer that question we have to look back at his life. Our lives are seldom highways with no junctions, as the years pass we have to pause and make decisions about what comes next, which way to go. And this was David’s experience, too.
Early years
His early years were spent at home with his parents and younger sister, and he worked in various agricultural jobs, cementing his love of animals at an early age particularly horses. This experience stayed with him and he said his lifetime ambition was to own a small holding, a little piece of land he could call his own. But his future lay elsewhere.
In the early 1950’s he was called up for national service and his years in the RAF brought him to Desford for a time. In 1953 he married Beryl, and they celebrated their 69th wedding anniversary in 2022.
In 1954 with his national service coming to an end, he was offered the chance to remain in the RAF and move to Canada to complete navigator training, but after discussing they decided against the Canada option. David’s future still lay elsewhere.
It’s only with hindsight that we can see that joining the massive Kayser Bondor factory in Baldock was the decision that changed his life. His career in the hosiery industry began and this was where his future lay.
A new career
Kaysor Bondor was a growing company in an era when staff were looked after by the most benevolent manufacturing companies. The Baldock factory had an open air swimming pool, tennis courts and gardens, a ballroom with many sports clubs and social activities. There was generous help to those who worked for the company and its associates in times of need, including coal or financial help for those suffering from long term illness, and widows with young children who were struggling to make ends meet. Staff morale was described as excellent and long service was rewarded. In return the staff had to participate in the piece work system, working hard to meet output targets and the company's "perfect or not quite perfect" standards. Someone such as David, working on quality control, would be well aware of the pressures on the women on the machines.
But over the coming decades the storm clouds of globalisation for the textile, knitwear and footwear industries were appearing on the horizon. Much of production capacity and jobs shifted to the developing world, and as production moved overseas there were widespread job losses.
It was in this environment that David became a union shop steward, becoming a full time union official in 1964 with the Leicester based National Union of Hosiery and Knitwear Workers (NUHKW). By 1975 he had risen to become General Secretary and then President in 1982, the year in which he was interviewed by ITV news about the decline in their membership caused by redundancies.
When the union merged with the National Union of Knitwear Footwear and Apparel Trades he became President of the merged group, and in the following year President of the International Textile Garment and Leatherworkers Federation.
During the same period he served as a General Council Member on the Trades Unions Congress, and his reputation continued to grow. He was always a confident and accomplished presenter, having a joke for every occasion. To get his message across he tried to find something that would spark a connection, to make people smile, and understand each other.
“In his Union work this was especially important: at a time when conflict was at an all-time high, Dad listened instead of shouting, and he got people talking,” his son Peter explained. “He always made you feel that he “got” you and found some common ground even if you didn’t have much in common. He’d usually be making a point - mischievously, warmly, but when you got to the end of one of his great stories, there would be a reason for it all. Someone standing up for themselves, an underdog getting a victory.”
Not just trade unions
It was these qualities, combined with his integrity and insight that made him a ‘must have’ member of so many organisations, including :
• the Employment Appeal Tribunal
• Board of Management Member, Ruskin College Oxford
• Member of Court, University of Leicester.
• the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE)
• Member of Regional and National Liaison Committee HM Reserve Forces
• Voluntary assistance and supervision - Workers Education Projects Africa and Asia
• Welbeck Defence 6th Form College– Governor.
David loved horses and back in the early 1960’s enjoyed training his greyhounds, Prince, Badger, and Fly. He was very good at it, with a potential switch to full time horse race training on the cards at one point. With a wife. and in due course three children, came family life and his children have many anecdotes to retell. These memories are like heirlooms that we take out of the cabinet on special occasions, to be polished and then put back safely to be retold again.
The letter
And out of the home it wasn’t all about the Big Stage, as David continued to support the Labour Party as Groby and Ratby Branch Treasurer until shortly before his death. It was this part of his work that Sir Keir Starmer wrote to thank him for.