JACK Jones, general secretary of the Transport and General Workers’ Union, told a Glasgow rally in October 1971 that if the government were to increase old age pensions to £8 for a single person and £14 for a married couple, it would ease unemployment.

“Pensioners need money so badly,” he said at an STUC rally at the City Hall, “that as soon as they get an increase they spend it.

“This spending causes a movement within the economy which provides employment. It could provide thousands of jobs for those out of work or threatened with redundancy. This is the sort of thing we must support.”

Jones, who had been in his TGWU post for two years, said it had been estimated that it would take £1,200m to pay the increases.

The current pensions were £6 for a single couple and £9.70 for a married couple. “That,” he said of the estimated sum, “is half the money this nation spends on defence and arms. A reduction in arms expenditure should be made to give our pensioners the extra money.”

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Some 4,000 pensioners (right) and many trade unionists had marched through city streets to voice support for their protest.

“If this government had any real care for the elderly, or compassion, as it claimed at the general election,” declared Abe Moffat, president of the Scottish Old Age Pensions Association, “it would have been more humane to use the money given in income tax relief to provide what we ask rather than hand it to the rich, who don’t need it.”

A collection for OAP campaign funds raised £682, including £50 given by Jimmy Reid on behalf of the shop stewards at Upper Clyde Shipbuilders, and £20 from Clydebank Town Council.