artswith Film


How Scottish factory workers took on the Pinochet regime


Forty four years ago, a group of Rolls Royce factory workers from East Kilbride grounded Augusto Pinochet’s murderous regime … and only now is their story being told. Scotland-based filmmaker Felipe


Bustos Sierra, the son of a Chilean exile, grew up hearing tales of remarkable international solidarity and set out to find the truth. It took him five years. “Over time the story became a bit


of a myth, with lots of embellishments and exaggerations,” he told Creative Scotland, which part-funded the project. “I was hoping to find the workers


and set the record straight. I never imagined I’d find so much about how much of an impact they’d had.” In 1973, engine inspector Bob


Fulton and his horrified colleagues watched on television as Hawker Hunter jets flew low over Santiago


20 | theJournalist


and fired rockets into the city centre, killing civilians during a brutal military coup. They recognised the jets because


they had worked on their Rolls Royce engines. So, when the engines were returned from Chile the following year, the workers refused to repair them. One night, in 1978, they mysteriously disappeared. Bustos Sierra tracked down the


workers who, 40 years on, had never realised the impact of their actions. He says: “If international solidarity


means anything to you, if you believe – like we do – we are all connected trying to make a life for ourselves while treating each other like human beings before politics, class, language or borders muddle it up, this story is for you and it has a painstakingly documented happy ending.” https://naepasaran.com/


attitude


by Tim Lezard


Festival Newport Rising 2-4 November Newport This new festival marks the last large-scale armed rebellion against authority in Great Britain. In 1839, an


estimated 10,000 Chartist sympathisers, many of them miners, marched through the Welsh town to free imprisoned fellow Chartists. Troops opened fire, killing 22 protestors. The leaders were sentenced to death. To commemorate the event,


organisers plan to reclaim the streets with a torch-lit march on the Westgate Hotel, street circus and drumming followed by a weekend of live music, theatre and street food. www.newportrising.co.uk


Music Wexford Festival Opera 19 October-4 November Wexford Wexford Festival Opera is renowned for discovering and presenting hidden gems, not only in its operas on stage but also in the outstanding cast of singers it presents. This year, its 67th, is no exception with a dynamic directory of divas from 11 countries singing such classics as Mala vita, L’oracolo, Il bravo and the somewhat less Italian Dinner at Eight. www.wexfordopera.com


Grace Petrie On tour throughout October Grace Petrie – a favourite of this column since Glastonbury campfire


singalongs with a previous general secretary a decade ago – is touring her eighth studio album this autumn, Entitled Queer as Folk. The Leicester singer uses the album’s lead track, Black Tie, to challenge what she describes as society’s ‘narrow view’ of gender. “I wrote this song to my younger


self, to say the way you are – and to anyone else who ever felt like they were – is not wrong. There is not just one way to be a woman.


There is not one way to be a man. You don’t even have to be either.” A new album, but already a classic. http://gracepetrie.com


Books


Bumblebee Nation David Crouch Karl-Adam Bonniers Stiftelse “It has such a fat body and such tiny wings, yet it flies.” So says David Crouch on how Sweden – with high wages, strong unions, generous welfare and regulated markets – defies the laws of economic gravity. The former Financial Times journalist and NUJ activist moved to Scandinavia five years ago to become a lecturer, and this lavishly designed and beautifully


illustrated book is the fruit of his labours. http://tinyurl.com/y8dp78c2


The Other Side of the Ribbon Brian Thomas Brian Thomas, a 71-year-old journalist, looks back at his career as a reporter in the rural South West in this scrapbook of local newspaper office eccentricities. The book is Illustrated throughout with cartoons.


Some of the best things to


see and do with a bit of political bite


For listings email: arts@NUJ.org.uk


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