Tuesday 27th November 1979

Derek ‘Red Robbo’ Robinson, senior shop steward and convenor at British Leyland’s Longbridge plant, was dismissed. According to the then British Leyland (BL) chairman Michael Edwardes, Red Robbo ‘had kept Longbridge in ferment and upheaval for 30 months [and] 523 disputes, with the loss of 62,000 cars and 113,000 engines, worth £200 million’.