Last month, Terry Renshaw and the other members of the Shrewsbury24 finally had their miscarriage of justice recognised and overturned by the Court of Appeal. Professional Builder’s Lee Jones talks to the former tradesman about his experiences.
It is a fight that has lasted a lifetime, and some of its campaigners would not live long enough to see their own vindication. After 47 years of vehemently protesting their innocence, the Court of Appeal overturned the convictions of the group that have become known as the Shrewsbury24. Having been charged with crimes ranging from affray to unlawful assembly following their involvement in an official union picket – with six of their number subsequently serving custodial sentences – it has since emerged that crucial evidence was destroyed by the police. “When I heard the judgement I did cry”, admits Terry Renshaw. “When it all started, I was a 24-year-old painter and decorator and now I’m an old man.”
The Flint-based tradesman had become involved with the trade union movement at an early age and, when the first ever national builders strike in protest at pay and conditions was called, he would enthusiastically offer his support. “Back then there was an average of one fatality every two days on site, and even the most basic amenities that would be taken for granted today, such as toilets, were unheard of,” he recalls. “We were asking for better pay and safety standards and initially the strike was selective, but quickly escalated to the whole country.”
Unbeknown to Terry and his companions the largely unremarkable events in Shrewsbury and Telford of 6th September 1972 would determine their destiny for nearly half a century, but there was no inkling as to its significance at the time. “We were picketing around Shrewsbury all that day and visited several sites, accompanied all the while by uniformed officers. The police actually thanked us for our conduct, wished us well on our departure, and not a single name was taken at the time,” he recalls of that fateful day. “Then, a full five months after the event, on the 14th February 1973, we were arrested. The only thing that had changed was that the strike had reached a very successful conclusion, and we had secured better terms for workers on site.”
It has been the contention of the group and its supporters ever since that the indictments were politically inspired, motivated by a bid to change picketing laws, discourage further industrial action, and part of a wider operation to characterise trade unions and their activists as extremists. Thanks to the tireless work of campaigners like Shrewsbury24 researcher Eileen Turnbull, it was revealed that initial hand-written witness testimony had been destroyed and new ones prepared by the police, a fact that was not made known to the court at the time.
“At the trial I was advised by my legal counsel that if I didn’t plead guilty to the charge of unlawful assembly I would be liable to three years in prison,” recalls Terry. “I refused and continued to maintain my innocence.” In his case the judge did not lay down a custodial sentence, but others were not so lucky. Six would spend time behind bars, including construction worker, Des Warren, who served 28 months of a three-year sentence for Conspiracy to Intimidate, and who died of Parkinson’s disease in 2004. Tragically, he is one of eight of the group who were charged with offences who did not live long enough to witness the Court of Appeal decision.
Ricky Tomlinson, then working as a labourer on the Wrexham by-pass, and who would later find fame as an actor in Brookside and the Royle Family, was also jailed. Ricky and Des Warren continued to protest whilst incarcerated, going on hunger strike, and refusing to wear prison clothes on the grounds of political prisoner status – a stance for which they would spend many months in solitary confinement.
The burden of being convicted for crimes they did not commit would not be the end of the ordeal, because, for many more years after, Terry and his fellow defendants were blacklisted from the industry, dismissed or refused work on the basis of their convictions, a further injustice that would inspire them to clear their names.
The official Shrewsbury 24 Campaign was set up in 2006 and papers were presented to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) in 2012. Terry recounts the long road to the successful judgement: “Eileen Turnbull did a wonderful job in unearthing new evidence, but in 2017 our case was again rejected. By that stage there were only eight of us that were willing to pursue the legal proceedings, with two withdrawing. We took the decision to lodge a judicial review. In 2019, at that review hearing, the CCRC asked the judge to have the case given back to them in order to reconsider. Ten months later the CCRC agreed to refer the case to the Court of Appeal, and on 23 March 2021 we finally got the decision that we deserved.”
At 73 years old, Terry Renshaw is now the youngest of the group, whilst Kevin Butcher, at 87 is the oldest member. It is their tenacity in refusing to accept the judgement of the courts that has seen justice done. We asked Terry what wider impact his conviction had over those years? “None of us ever considered ourselves to be criminals and that was a stigma that we had to live with and were determined to eradicate. Official papers relating to our trial have still not been released, and we want to know why that is the case? It is evident that there had been a level of state intervention in our conviction,” he concludes, “which shouldn’t have happened. It was that knowledge that made us determined to continue to fight.”
For further information on the case of the Shrewsbury24 visit www.shrewsbury24campaign.org.uk/
