PICKETING PAST: a picture gallery of Wiganers on strike over the decades

This year will be remembered as one dogged by industrial disputes as all manner of public and private sector workers took to the picket lines in fights for better pay or conditions. But of course this is nothing new, as this gallery of pictures taken of Wigan folk on strike from Victorian times through to the first decade of this millennium shows.

By Charles Graham

Published 29th Sep 2023, 04:55 GMT

Wigan industrial unrest: 1893 to 2011.

1. NUPE health workers strike at Wigan Infirmary with MP Les Huckfield (centre) in 1983

. Photo: SUBMITTED

2. A coach and horses outside the JJB headquarters in support of a GMB union strike at Martland Mill

. Photo: Frank Orrell

3. Strikers at Wigan Gasworks in 1976

. Photo: STAFF

4. Pickets at the Bulldog Tools factory in Wigan.

. Photo: Gary Brunskill

Wigan Victorian