Mary Turner (trade unionist)
Mary Josephine Turner
Early life
Turner was born in
Political affiliations
Turner was active in the Labour Party, and engaged in a wide variety of political activism from the 1970s onwards, including opposition to the National Front and organising catering for the People's March for Jobs. In 1989, when some party members in Brent East tried to deselect Ken Livingstone, Turner was one of two candidates to stand against him, although ultimately Livingstone was comfortably reselected.[5] She was a candidate for the Labour nomination for the seat again in 2000, after Livingstone was expelled from the party, but on that occasion lost out to Paul Daisley.[6]
She was elected to the
Turner was elected to the executive of the union, which became the GMB, in 1983;[2] initially, she was the only woman on the executive.[8] In 1997, she was elected as the union's president, and was re-elected every year thereafter. During the 2010s, she suffered from increasingly poor health, but she remained active in the union until her death in 2017.[4]
Turner was made a
References
- ^ Peta Steel, "Mary Turner, trade unionist and president of GMB union", The Independent, 22 July 2017
- ^ a b "Our Mary - Celebrating the life of Mary Turner", GMB London
- ^ a b c "Mary Turner, Labour party executive and president of GMB union, dies after long illness", The Telegraph, 20 July 2017
- ^ a b Nicola Slawson, "Mary Turner, longtime president of GMB, dies after long illness", The Guardian, 19 July 2017
- ^ Ken Livingstone, You Can't Say That
- ^ Richard Adams, "Diary", The Guardian, 27 September 2000
- ^ "Passing of Mary Turner", GMB, 19 July 2017
- ^ "Mary Turner", The Times, 20 July 2017