The first sign that inquisitive visitors were no longer welcome at Wapping came in January when barbed wire went up around the site. In the same month, Tony Britton, News Group’s labour relations manager, rebuffed Tony Isaacs, the Imperial Father at the News of the World machine chapel, when the latter indicated he was ready to restart negotiations for working at Wapping after all. The unions had missed the boat and, having seen an opportunity to escape them for good, Murdoch was not going to send out a rescue craft to pick them up.
Without the involvement of the EETPU in recruiting suitable staff, launching Wapping would have been all but impossible.23 With 365,000 members, the union was the eighth largest in the TUC. Since 1982, its general secretary had been Eric Hammond, a political moderate who was used to confrontation. His speeches at TUC and Labour Party conferences were usually drowned out by a chorus of jeers and catcalls leading him on one occasion to assure delegates that Hitler would have been proud of them. In the early 1980s, the EETPU’s London press branch had been led by the hard-left. But, following a thwarted attempt to merge with SOGAT, the London Branch had lost its power over employment to the area office. Hammond did not forget SOGAT’s attempt to poach his members and extinguish the union’s Fleet Street presence. He had been shown no interunion fraternity and would offer none in return. This was the man with whom Murdoch could do business.
Accompanied by Tom Rice, Hammond had his first meeting with Murdoch and Bruce Matthews on 31 January 1985. The secret gathering took place at the house of Murdoch’s intermediary, Woodrow Wyatt. It was there that Hammond made the assurance that his electricians could not only set up Wapping but also run it. From this moment onwards, what was never more than a verbal understanding became an article of faith with, in particular, Murdoch’s future riding upon it. In April, the collusion began in earnest, with Tom Rice flying out to the United States with Christopher Pole-Carew. Joined by John Keating, they toured several newspaper plants, including USA Today and the Washington Post, to see the modern technology at work.
Given the need to keep the plot a secret, the hiring of electricians for Wapping could not be done in London. Instead the EETPU did the recruitment in Southampton via an independent employment agency that conducted the interviewing (and vetting). Most of those selected were unemployed EETPU members or their friends and relatives who grasped the opportunity to get a job at what was considered a decent wage. Every day, these men were bussed the eighty miles to work at Wapping and then bussed back again. When, many months later, the plan was eventually revealed, the use of Southampton electricians caused resentment from existing London EETPU members who had been kept in the dark about it. In the view of the SOGAT general secretary, Brenda Dean, this was ‘the greatest treachery of all’.24 But it was inconceivable that Wapping’s ‘staffing-up’ could have been kept secret if job application forms had been distributed across London.
While the covert use of the electricians to get the Wapping plant ready gathered pace, other aspects of the plan were put in motion. Merely getting the plant to function was not, in itself, enough. News International could print any number of newspapers but if they could not get them distributed properly they would just pile up at the plant’s front gate. As with its competitors, the company had a contract with British Rail to transport its papers. From the trains the bundles were taken to 250 wholesalers who then distributed them to the country’s forty thousand newsagents. But here was a snag: the wholesale workers were all SOGAT members. Thus, if the rail unions and SOGAT refused to handle newspapers coming out of Wapping they could kill the project. With great secrecy, Murdoch’s men devised a way round this hurdle: they would pull out of their contractual obligations with British Rail and sign a deal with the Australian road-freight company TNT instead. TNT depots would be used round the country, cutting out the wholesalers, and deliveries would be made directly to the newsagents.
Getting a list of all the newsagents’ addresses involved a good deal of surreptitious research and some wholesalers may have experienced the strange sensation of feeling they were being followed as they went about their work. In fact, using lorries was significantly more expensive than using trains. TNT had 1500 vehicles and Wapping’s requirement of eight hundred (and up to two thousand new drivers and distributors) was more than they could spare. In return for increasing their fleet accordingly, TNT got News International to underwrite the £7 million additional outlay if the unions did not strike and the train system could be used after all. Even with this agreement, there remained one potential snag: TNT had a closed-shop agreement with the TGWU whose members drove the lorries. If the drivers responded to their union’s call not to enter Wapping, News International would be back with the problem of having piles of newspapers and no means of distributing them. But it was a risk that had to be taken. In June 1985, TNT was given a five-year contract. Meanwhile, British Rail knew nothing of the fact they were shortly to be dumped.
By then the computer system had been installed that would revolutionize newspaper editing and production. The decision to buy Atex had been taken in March. Murdoch wanted to use a system that was tried and tested rather than state of the art because only simple processes could be quickly picked up by ‘half-trained manpower’.25 It would be a disaster if the Wapping opportunity was squandered because staff could not figure out how to work the technology within their deadlines. It would have been easier and cheaper to use Atex’s UK subsidiary, but the risk of news of the order leaking out was considered too great. Instead, the $10 million order was placed with the US parent company. The mainframes and typesetting equipment were huge and could have attracted attention while being shipped over from Boston, so they were transported in unmarked boxes and routed via Paris just to doubly confuse anyone who was monitoring their progress. Under the direction of Ben Smylie, the American-only staff charged with creating the software and installing the equipment were also flown over, their tracks suitably covered behind them.
Away from the prying eyes of Fleet Street, ‘Smylie’s People’ (as they inevitably became known) got to work assembling the computer mainframes in a dilapidated but suitably anonymous shed by the Thames Barrier at Woolwich – codenamed ‘The Bunker’. A small plaque was affixed, announcing that the shed belonged to ‘Caprilord Limited’, the cover company created to mask Atex’s involvement. With a security guard posted to dissuade curious passers-by and the mist rising from the river, the scene had something of an illicit gangland operation about it, not least when the limousine of ‘Gorbals’ Wilson drew up to appraise the handiwork. Charged with designing the layout of the new offices as well as launching the London Post, Wilson was the Murdoch lieutenant who worked closest with the Atex team in getting the editorial floors technologically operational. Murdoch, the Godfather, visited on 20 April. On 1 May the first test run proved successful. At the end of the month the mainframes were transported over to Wapping, in the dead of night, in long, customized lorries. It was a sign of management’s jumpiness that a helicopter flying low overhead just as the lorries were passing through the gates caused momentary alarm that the move was being monitored by spies hired by the unions. But the helicopter moved on, allowing the mainframes to be unloaded and installed on the fourth floor, behind doors that needed a special code to open. Weeks of teething problems and reconfigurations lay ahead, but ‘Project X’ was well underway.
Meanwhile, back at Gray’s Inn Road the journalists were still unaware of the major news story that was waiting to burst. In league with the print unions, the NUJ prohibited any of their members from touching the three or four Atex terminals located on the editorial floor, leading one journalist to glance wistfully at the banned technology and murmur, ‘I have seen the future and it’s got dust on it.’26 Little did he appreciate what was being installed a few miles to the east. Wilson and Douglas-Home maintained the façade. The situation was the same at the other News International titles. At the Sunday Times only the editor, Andrew Neil (who had experience of using Atex at his pre
vious berth at The Economist), and James Adams knew what was being planned although Ivan Fallon, the deputy editor, had his suspicions confirmed.27 But as the scheme proceeded to plan, so it became necessary to pass the ‘Wapping Cough’ onto a few more key personnel who, under the cover of sick leave, prepared the ground for the move.
In March, the company had publicly stated its intention to launch the new tabloid newspaper for the capital, the London Post. This was the biggest of all the ruses. It was not just a cover story for explaining signs of activity at Wapping. On the advice of News International’s lawyer, Geoffrey Richards at Farrar & Co., London Post (Printers) Limited was established as Wapping’s operating company. Thus, Wapping was given a separate legal identity from News Group in Bouverie Street and Times Newspapers in Gray’s Inn Road. Come a strike, this would prove significant since it would allow the trade union legislation against secondary action to be invoked. It was formally announced that Charles Wilson was the Post’s editorial director. Oddly, this did not involve his standing down as deputy editor of The Times, but this point was passed over, perhaps because Wilson was well known for his multitasking skills. He even went as far as interviewing journalists for positions on the paper. One of those who turned up naively for an interview was Julie Burchill, who was poised to emerge as one of Fleet Street’s more outspoken columnists and controversalists. Murdoch never intended the Post to see the light of day although if the unions managed, somehow, to prevent The Times and the other existing titles from being switched to Wapping, then there was the fallback possibility of launching The Post as an interim measure. In these circumstances, it might be the only way of getting Wapping operational. To that extent, the paper was not a complete fiction, but it would only hit the streets if the main plan failed and those responsible for establishing the shadow paper – in particular Charles Wilson – had no intention of letting the main plan fail.28 Indeed, part of the cunning of the Post project was that it incited the unions to play into Murdoch’s hands. It was hoped that merely the prospect of the Post being printed without their agreement would – at the appropriate moment – provoke the Sun, News of the World, Times and Sunday Times printers to come out on strike. In doing so they would provide Murdoch with the grounds to sack them and move his four papers to Wapping where they would be printed by staff happy to work there.
Wilson was the right man for the job. At the Chicago Sun-Times he had experienced at first hand how complete editorial control could work. At the Sun-Times, suggestions were acted upon at a time when in Fleet Street they would have created only months of consultation, negotiation and eventual cancellation. What was more, unlike Douglas-Home, Wilson understood the technical side of production. He brought a tight group of lieutenants with him to head-up the Post: Mike Hoy, Richard Williams, David Banks, John Bryant and (later) Tim Austin. All believed it was the Post they were working on. Sworn to secrecy, they were installed in a back room at Gray’s Inn Road and even accessed the building from a different entrance. In charge of subbing dummies of the paper, Austin was sent across to the Chicago Sun-Times for a fortnight’s crash course on using the computer technology.29
The extent of the conspirators’ secrecy seemed extreme: meeting venues were checked for bugs and long-range listening devices; key executives were advised to trim trees and bushes in their gardens in case they camouflaged eavesdroppers and to consider buying a dog. Ex-Royal Navy, Christopher Pole-Carew was in charge of directing the Wapping defences. When, after he had listed the security measures, Murdoch asked if there was anything else, Pole-Carew replied, ‘well, that’s all we can do, unless we use guns’. This was doubtless intended as a joke, although the nervous glance exchanged by Murdoch and Wilson suggested the need for reassurance. The subsequent proposal that the way to defeat the pickets’ interference with small lorries coming into the plant was to file the underside of the lorries’ bumpers to razor sharpness was not taken up. Some wondered if Pole-Carew was becoming overzealous.
In fact, the need for vigilance – rather than vigilante-ness – was real. Comings and goings at Wapping were being monitored by Tony Cappi, a SOGAT member, and Terry Ellis of the AUEW. By establishing contacts with those contracted to set up the plant, they were able to gain intelligence reports on what was going on behind the Wapping barbed wire. They discovered that Atex mainframes had been installed. To a sales manager of NAPP Systems, they posed as potential customers interested in purchasing photopolymer printing plates. They were told the company was supplying Wapping. Some of the work could be explained away as ongoing preparation for the Post’s launch if or when the unions gave it the go-ahead. But the Post was to be a tabloid. In May, Cappi and Ellis learned that the presses were being configured to print broadsheets. Cappi left an urgent message at the office of SOGAT General Secretary Brenda Dean and finally got to speak to her in June. From that moment on, he was a regular supplier of information.30 In July, Dean had a meeting with the various chapel fathers, but it was not until the following month that, accompanied by SOGAT and NGA officials, she managed to get an appointment to speak with Bruce Matthews and Pole-Carew at Bouverie Street. The extent to which these two men provided obfuscatory answers was evident in the subsequent statement Dean released:
I am pleased to say that they both totally denied that any personnel were being recruited or were currently working in the premises being trained in jobs traditionally done by SOGAT members. The electricians and engineers working in the plant are engaged on the installation of electrical wiring and equipment.31
But it was not long before Brenda Dean had cause to doubt the helpful explanations she had received. By September, Cappi’s spies had copied the names and numbers of over five hundred people with access to working at Wapping. Dean was in Blackpool for the last day of the TUC conference when she received a telephone call from a spy informing her that dummy runs of the Post had been successfully run off the Wapping presses. This was incontrovertible proof that the electricians were doing rather more than a bit of wiring. They were actually printing newspapers. Dean immediately got in touch with Tony Dubbins of the NGA and the various London officials. ‘My own view,’ she told them, ‘is that we should stop the whole of News International tonight.’ Dubbins pondered the options. Militants subsequently believed Dean had been slow to ascertain the seriousness of the situation although, according to her own recollection, she said:
Come on! Let’s get real about this. Fleet Street stops at the drop of a hat for absolutely bugger all. This is not about money it’s about jobs. We need to get home to Murdoch that we’re not having it. We want to get to that negotiating table now, before they go any further … What’s wrong with you all? Now’s the time to strike! What’s wrong with you all?
She was sure that Murdoch was playing for time but, if confronted with the shutdown of all four of his titles, he would have to respond and respond on terms dictated by the unions. Back at home, at tea time on the Saturday, she got a call from SOGAT’s general officer, Bill Miles. He said he had had a meeting with Bruce Matthews and the News International management. They had offered negotiations for the unions to work at Wapping and, therefore, the members had decided not to call a lightning strike. ‘Of course,’ Miles added, ‘the chapels have said if you as General Secretary instruct them to come out, they’ll stop the job tonight.’ There was a short pause. ‘Bill,’ sighed Dean, ‘if they’re not prepared to stand up for themselves, I’m not prepared to put the union on the line for them.’
Thus the unions missed their opportunity to bring down Murdoch’s media empire at the moment of his greatest vulnerability – while he was heavily in debt because of his expensive acquisitions in the American market and before he was ready to launch Wapping to produce the newspapers that kept him creditworthy. Instead the unions opted to be locked into months of fruitless negotiations during which time Wapping was brought into operational readiness. ‘It was like a wife who is told her husband is playing away but refuses to accept it is happening’ was how Wilson int
erpreted the moment of union self-denial.32 Reflecting on the missed opportunity eighteen years later, Dean could still not comprehend how such a ‘major tactical error’ could have been made. ‘It was a complete reverse of normal animal behaviour from our people,’ she concluded. ‘Normally they took action first and asked questions after.’33
V
The most important twenty months in Fleet Street’s history passed between February 1985 and October 1986. In the popular market, News International faced sharper competition from Robert Maxwell’s Mirror Group where a redundancy package was ruthlessly forced through. In the midmarket, there was the promise of similar savings at the Express while a new newspaper, Today, was planned by Eddy Shah using the latest technology and avoiding the traditional print unions. There was a similar situation in the broadsheet market where The Times faced new threats not only from its principal rival, the Daily Telegraph, which was rescued from bankruptcy, but from the launch of a new newspaper, the Independent, proudly trumpeting its sovereignty from traditional press baron ownership. In the space of twenty months, Fleet Street was destroyed as the capital of the newspaper kingdom.
The catalyst for some of these changes was an event Murdoch had originally opposed – the flotation of Reuters. In return for bailing the news agency out in 1941, the various Fleet Street titles, through the Newspaper Publishers’ Association, had taken on a 41 per cent share in the company. Diversification into financial services information technology had subsequently made Reuters profitable. Its profits had quadrupled in Gerald Long’s last year as its managing director and doubled again in 1982. By purchasing Times Newspapers, Murdoch had doubled his potential shareholding. If it was floated on the stock exchange, it could realize him between £90 and £100 million. As one of the ten directors on the Reuters board, Murdoch thus had an interest in pushing for the company to be floated. But floating Reuters was against the spirit of the terms that had been agreed in 1941 (in a document drawn up by William Haley who was subsequently The Times’s editor). What was more, it would give Murdoch no obvious advantage over his Fleet Street rivals since they would all make similar gains. He did not push for Reuters to be floated. But others on the board were intent on liquidating their assets and in 1984 the company was duly quoted on the stock exchange. While Murdoch chose to hold onto his shares, rivals went for the quick profit. The Guardian realized £70 million, paying off all its debts as a consequence and laying the groundwork for a new printing plant in London’s Docklands. Associated Newspapers, owner of the Daily Mail and a range of regional titles, netted the most. By 1990, it had realized £300 million from its Reuters shares and built new print works in Docklands. Across Fleet Street, proprietors now had the ready money to push for expansion.34
The History of the Times Page 33