Ken Gill

Ken Gill (30 August 1927 – 23 May 2009) was a British trade union leader. He was the General Secretary of the Technical, Administrative and Supervisory Section (TASS), from 1974 to 1988, when it merged with ASTMS to form the Manufacturing, Science and Finance Union (MSF). Gill was politicised when young, having experienced poverty in his childhood during the Great Depression. He attended a grammar school and was offered officer training during the Second World War, but refused this owing to a political opposition to the officer class. In 1943, aged 15, he became an apprentice draughtsman. During the war his family took in a lodger, a cobbler and communist who convinced the young Gill of the cause of socialism. In 1945 he was a prominent campaigner for the local Labour candidate, who was elected as the first local Labour MP. During the merger talks MI5 broke into Gill's South London home to bug discussions going on there.

Gill became the General Secretary of TASS in 1974, and that same year was the third communist to be elected on to the TUC General Council, with over 7 million votes.

From the mid-1970s Gill used his position on the TUC Council to push for more radical policies in support of equal opportunities. In 1976 he "famously told the TUC Woman's Conference ... that Britain was still a 'socially backward' country,"

Retirement and death After his retirement, Gill continued campaigning, including against the 2003 Iraq war. He also played a key role in the 1993 founding of the Cuba Solidarity Campaign in the UK, becoming its first chair, only stepping down in 2008.

Gill was also known for his caricatures of fellow trade unionists, and often made on scraps of paper during meetings and conferences. An exhibition of his work was held at Congress House in 2007,

Gill died on 23 May 2009, at the age of 81.

Books Ken Gill (Author), John Green and Michal Boncza (Editors), 2009 – Hung, Drawn and Quartered, Artery Publications. The book is a selection of Gill's caricatures.

The Ken Gill Memorial Fund A non-charitable trust was established in 2010 by Ken's family and close friends to commemorate Ken's life and to continue his life's work. Among its objectives are supporting the Morning Star newspaper, supporting the trade union movement and workers' rights through co-operation with the Institute of Employment Rights and to support solidarity with Cuba, working alongside the Cuba Solidarity Campaign. Trustees included Rodney Bickerstaffe, former general secretary of Unison, the UK's largest public services union.