One in four workers in the UK are members of a trade union, and the last few years have shown an increase in their numbers. Yet a theatre piece rarely represents either the organisation or its members.
That alone makes the play Chopped Liver and Unions about the activist Sara Wesker unique. The performance also touches on the fight for equal pay for women doing the same job as men, along with the famous battle against the fascist danger of Mosley’s Black Shirts at Cable Street. The show is peppered with inspiring songs such as “Solidarity Forever” and “Close the Gates”.
Sara, given a confident fluent performance by Lottie Walker, explains that the final straw that pushed her to make a stand against the bosses was her certainty that the women she worked with were being paid less than the men working in the factory next door. She says, “why should it matter what we have between our legs?”
Not everyone is convinced action will work, but, as Sara points out, “the biggest machine can be brought to a stop by the removal of the smallest cog. Then you became a barrier between the man and his profits.”
The show takes the form of a factual monologue in which Sara takes us through her involvement with aspects of her personal life with Mick, another union activist, along with her growing trade union struggles and her membership of the Communist Party.
Lottie Walker is always entertaining and informative, but the play’s descriptive strength lacks dramatic tension and can feel oddly static. However, it's an important part of our history well worth seeing.