BRYAN STANLEYBryan Stanley, who died on 19 July, 2009, was general secretary of the Post Office Engineering Union for 14 years.He led the POEU from 1972 to 1986 and was also on the national executive committee of the Labour Party from 1973 to 1978.He was born in Walsall in the West Midlands on 3 May, 1926, the first day of that year’s general strike.He began working for the Post Office, digging trenches to lay telephone cables, at 14 and joined the union straight away.He trained as an engineer and became an active campaigner for both the POEU and Labour in the 1940s, eventually rising to his prestigious ranks.After a lifetime’s service to the union, he retired at the age of 60, but then took up a position with the Industrial Tribunals Panel and became a local councillor in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire where he lived.His son, Peter Stanley, paid tribute to him after his death: “My dad was a private but caring and loving family man who also happened to be an extremely generous man who cared deeply about the community he lived in.”His former union, now known as the Communication Workers Union, said in a statement: “Bryan Stanley was the first General Secretary of the then POEU to be elected by the membership. He led the hard and tough fight against privatisation of telecommunications in the early 1980s.“Bryan was an amazing man and a solid Labour and Trade Unionist until the day he died.”
Keep me informed of updates
