obituaries


him it would be honoured, eventually tired of having to negotiate with the union and started its move to derecognise the NUJ. Mike lost his job in the early 1990s. He freelanced successfully, writing


for several trade magazines as well as for the trade union GMB’s construction section and occasionally for national papers, but his heart was in trade union work. He was a member of the NUJ


national executive council and of the magazine and book industrial council and, in 1996, he was elected general treasurer. In the autumn of 2001, he got the


job he wanted to do more than anything: he became an NUJ national organiser, looking after members in magazines and books. His close friend and colleague


from that time, the then freelance organiser John Toner, says: “His many years as a committed activist enabled him to slot into the job immediately. He was hard- working, diligent in personal cases


and a skilful negotiator, as many grateful members could attest.” He left the job in 2006. Mike was a large man, physically


imposing, with strong beliefs but a gentle and kindly nature. Many people (including the present writer) have cause to remember his acts of quiet kindness and generosity. He loved trade unions, jazz and Young’s beer, and worked off his heroic consumption of the last-named by digging his allotment. He followed football, cricket and athletics, and was encyclopaedic about all of them. Mike married Ruth Lawrence in 1973. Teir daughter, Rosie May, born in 1979, runs Juno Books, a feminist and queer indie bookshop in Sheffield. Mike and Ruth divorced in 1986 and, from 1989, he lived with his partner Maggie Coates until she died two years ago. In addition to Rosie May, he leaves a grandson, Arthur May, and a stepdaughter, Nikki Cooney.


Francis Beckett


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Mike Sherrington


Mike Sherrington, who has died aged 75, was a dedicated NUJ activist from the day he entered journalism, becoming successively father of chapel (FoC) at International Tompson magazines, a member of the national executive, general treasurer and a national organiser. Born in March 1951 in Carshalton,


he grew up in Ashtead, Surrey, and worked as a surveyor in Wokingham. Tis expertise enabled him to persuade Construction News to take him on and turn him into a journalist. While he enjoyed journalism, it


was not long before he found his real vocation – trade union work. For most of his time at Construction


26 | theJournalist


News, he represented his colleagues on all the International Tompson titles as their FoC. Tis was a big job. He represented


several hundred journalists working on more than 30 publications including Broadcast, Big Farm Weekly, Building Trades Journal, Communications International, Retail Jeweller, Drapers Record, Men’s Wear, Building Today, and New Electronics. He was, by common consent, a


first class FoC, long serving and greatly respected and, as often happens with the best FoCs, it did his career in journalism no good at all. Te management, which at first valued his integrity, knowing that if they could reach an agreement with


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