Late 1980s campaigns

The vast majority of the papers in this file relate to an Action Conference on Immigration and Nationality in Birmingham organised by both Indian Workers Associations (GB); the Bangladeshi Workers Association; Kashmir Workers Association; Pakistani organisations and African Caribbean organisations at Birmingham Council House 25 October 1987. There is also material relating to other campaigns during 1988 and 1989, including demonstrations against immigration legislation; May Day celebrations; and a memorial rally to mark the tenth anniversary of the death of Blair Peach. Papers consist of correspondence; flyers; reports and statements; and press cuttings

Papers relating to the Action Conference on Immigration and Nationality consist of programmes and flyers for the event; statement of the aims of the conference; typescript summary of conference proceedings; delegate lists divided into sections to record the names of individuals and organisations from different sectors, including race relations and research units, welfare rights and community organisations, political, trades unions and campaigning organisations, community relations councils, workers associations, and anti-deportation and refugee campaigns; draft and final versions of declarations and resolutions passed at the conference; copy of a press release issued following the conference; press cutting from 'The Birmingham Post' reporting on topics discussed at the conference; correspondence from delegates and supporters including Campaign Against Racist Laws [CARL], Hackney Anti-Deportation Campaign; Keith Vaz, Labour MP for Leicester East, and Khurshid Ahmed, Birmingham City Council Race Relations Unit. Some of this correspondence discusses the expenses incurred by the Indian Workers Association in organising the conference

Other papers consist of:

/23 photocopy of a letter from Ron Todd, General Secretary of the Transport and General Workers Union [TGWU] to national and regional secretaries of the union, discussing imminent immigration rule changes and the loss of rights of some people to register as British citizens, 13 August 1987

/24 dossier concerning the Judicial Review of Viraj Mendis's case, published by the Viraj Mendis Defence Campaign, September 1987. Viraj Mendis was in sanctuary in the Church of the Ascension in Manchester in the hope that he would not be deported to Sri Lanka where he believed his personal safety would be under threat

/25 flyer issued by supporters of Salema Begum, a thirteen year old Bangladeshi girl in Oldham facing separation from her family because of a Home Office removal order. She was given sanctuary in Chorlton Central Church in Manchester, and the flyer asks people to write to their MP and to Home Office minister Timothy Renton, and appeals for donations to the campaign for Salema to remain in the country, October 1987

/26 photocopy of a newspaper article from 'The Times' reporting on an immigration appeal tribunal on the part of Saranjit Singh Atwal, 14 October 1987

/27 newspaper article from unidentified Birmingham newspaper containing articles about changes to the rules governing the rights of Commonwealth immigrants to British citizenship, October 1987

/28 flyer issued by NALGO/NUPE/NUJ/NUS giving details about a national demonstration against deportations and racist immigration laws 14 November 1987

/29 handwritten list of demonstrators taking part in a national demonstration against immigration legislation and lobby of Parliament 10 December 1987

/30-/32 copy letters from Avtar Jouhl on behalf of the Indian Workers Association to NALGO, NATFHE and TGWU thanking them for their support and financial contributions to the lobby of Parliament 10 December 1987 and informing them of the date and location of the next Campaign Against Racist Laws meeting, 8 January 1988

/33 copy letter from Avtar Jouhl to Dave Cook, referring to a recent article by Cook in 'Marxism Today' which Jouhl disagrees with, with a reply from Dave Cook who agrees to keep their differences outside their work for Campaign Against Racist Laws, 8-11 January 1988

/34 letter from Ajit Sandhu, Campaign Against Racist Laws [CARL] Leicester to unidentified recipient addressed as 'comrade', presumably Avtar Jouhl, giving details about a public meeting of CARL Leicester, 20 January 1988

/35 photocopy of a newspaper report in the 'Walsall Chronicle' on protests by the Indian Workers Association against the planned poll tax and the Conservative government's immigration legislation, 6 May 1988

/36 photocopy of a letter from Naranjan Singh Noor, Indian Workers Association (GB) Wolverhampton, to Dave Cook, thanking him for a draft broadsheet on the possible implications of the 1992 Single European Act, and renewing his organisation's application for affiliation to Campaign Against Racist Laws [CARL], claiming that he belongs to a founder organisation of CARL, 14 January 1989

/37 letter from Sheena Clarke, Labour Committee on Ireland, to Avtar Jouhl, thanking him to speaking at the organisation's Annual General Meeting and enclosing a copy of the minutes [now lost], 12 March 1989

/38 flyers in English, Punjabi and Urdu issued by the Blair Peach Memorial Committee and the Blair Peach 10 Anniversary Committee, giving information about a memorial rally 23 April 1989 for Blair Peach, killed during a demonstration against a National Front march in April 1979.

/39 statement on the history and importance of May Day: International Workers Day, on the 100th anniversary of the first occasion on which May Day was celebrated as an international festival, reprinted from 'Workers Weekly' 29 April 1989

/40 flyer in English and Punjabi issued by Indian Workers Association Coventry giving information about May Day celebrations at Barras Green Social Club, 1 May 1989. The flyer includes the names of speakers, poets and singers at the event

/41 flyer in English and Punjabi for May Day: International Workers Day 1989, giving details about the march, rally and other events organised for trade unionists and their families at Hall Green Trade Union Studies Centre, Digbeth, Birmingham

/42 copy letter from Avtar Jouhl to Councillor Dick Knowles, disassociating the Indian Workers Association from an incident in which Knowles was challenged at the May Day rally, and discussing the Indian Workers Association's campaign against the poll tax, together with other black organisations, and asking the Birmingham Labour Party to provide leadership in this campaign, 3 May 1989

/43 copy letter from Avtar Jouhl to Nick Hay, Secretary of Birmingham National Association of Local Government Officers [NALGO], regarding travel costs for NALGO members on the Indian Workers Association coach to the Blair Peach memorial rally, 3 May 1989

The file also contains three newspaper reports in Punjabi relating to Indian Workers Association campaigns during this period and a handwritten report by Avtar Jouhl about a demonstration in Birmingham against the poll tax, 6 December 1988