IT'S ALMOST THE DEADLINE [539]

The General Strike of 4th to 12th May 1926 was called by the Trade Union Congress (TUC) in sympathy with British coal miners, whose wages and working conditions had eroded and declined in the years after the First World War. The first day saw an estimated 1.5-1.75 million workers on strike, the TUC had restricted participation to key industries: iron and steel, transport, shipping ports, and printing.

However, as “The Times” reported in its edition of 5th May, “The printing industry is at a standstill, but lithographers have not been withdrawn, and compositors in London have not received instructions to strike.”

I have owned a copy of this issue of “The Times” for years, but never properly scrutinised its bizarre appearance. It is a single sheet of foolscap-sized paper (32 x 20 cm) – I have since discovered this edition is known as “Little Sister”, in comparison with the “Big Brother” of the regular broadsheet – printed on both sides in dense typewriter text, the only picture being King’s coat of arms in the paper’s masthead. 

I had seen similar examples of other newspapers printed during the strike in similarly reduced circumstances – there exists rudimentary editions of the “Daily Mirror”, “Daily Mail” and “The Daily Telegraph” – but with “The Times” being Britain’s (unofficial) newspaper of record, with an unbroken print run since 1785, this was the one to have. My copy now resides in a mylar bag, to prevent decomposition of the fragile newsprint paper, a relic of a moment in time.

As “The Times” recently discussed [link], its 5th May 1926 edition was produced and distributed by volunteers and helpers corralled by John Jacob Astor, the then owner of the paper, having already been made aware at a meeting, of newspaper proprietors with the British Government, that its intention was to publish an official Government newspaper to provide both official news and the Government’s viewpoint during the strike, either as a collective effort with the industry, or by itself. This became “The British Gazette”, published by His Majesty’s Stationery Office from the requisitioned premises of “The Morning Post”, using staff from that paper and the “Daily Express”, and edited by the former journalist and current Chancellor of the Exchequer, Winston Churchill.

With printing presses unavailable, six “Multigraph” machines were used to print my copy of “The Times”. These table-top devices, more used by offices for printing direct mail and forms, these involved sliding individual letters, spaces and punctuation onto a cylinder, with motorised versions printed six to seven thousand copies an hour. Haste and inexperience with loading sentences backwards explain many spelling errors, most notably the “WEATHER ORECAST” at the top of the front page, but these were apparently fixed for a second edition the same day, so I now know my copy was from the first edition.

The following days’ editions of “The Times” looked more like the regular paper, printed on its regular presses by an amateur team only just shown how to operate the equipment, but with its page count reduced to one broadsheet folded into four pages. This was partly a result of Churchill requesting newsprint stock for printing “The British Gazette” – originally requesting access to their entire stock for an explicitly Government mouthpiece, “The Times” would only relinquish a quarter of it.

In media terms, the legacy of the General Strike is usually the granting of a Royal Charter to the then-private British Broadcasting Company, having maintained its independent and impartial radio broadcasting during the strike in the face of a threat from Churchill to requisition it for Government use in a manner similar to “The British Gazette”, which still published programme listings for BBC stations like it was a regular paper. The “Little Sister” edition of “The Times” is a further reminder that the UK only ever had state media once, a hundred years ago, for less than two weeks.

The 1926 General Strike ended without agreement, with miners continuing to strike for a further few months. Much later, an industrial dispute over modernising work practices at “The Times” and “The Sunday Times” led to Thomson Newspapers, which bought them from the Astor family in 1966, to suspend production of the papers for nearly a year from December 1978, breaking a near two hundred year print run.

DOWN ON OUR WORDS [423]

The story of the Co-Op grocery chain’s “ambient sausage roll” has lived at the back of my head for at least a decade, as a go-to example of a non-sequitur: “ambient” is an odd description for a foodstuff, even if the context is explained. All I know of the story is that sausage rolls were sold with this label, and later withdrawn as someone admitted the word was used without confirming its meaning first.

Coming from the land of bubble and squeak¹, Stargazy Pie² and the Bedfordshire Clanger³, “ambient” is hardly a strange enough word to cause offence, but in January 2010, it apparently did. Using the few news articles I found of it online from the following month, I put together the following statement that was issued by something named the Plain English Campaign: “We’ve had quite a few people call to say they’ve seen these ‘ambient sausage rolls’ on sale at the Co-op. It’s caused much amusement. I know it’s supposed to be ‘all at the Co-op’ but what on earth is an ambient sausage roll’?”

This was followed up by a spokesman from the Co-Op: “The use of the word 'ambient' on the label of this product was an administrative error - labels for in-store bakery items are printed in store and the word 'ambient' was incorrectly printed on the label. This is now being rectified but thank you for drawing this to our attention and apologies for any confusion this may have caused.”

“The Daily Telegraph” apparently had an editorial comment at the time calling it a “small victory for plain English”, but I am not willing to pay to read what more they said on the matter. I would still like to think of it as a mistake that can be interpreted as a bit of fun.

The Plain English Campaign is a group focussed on eradicating legal and medical jargon, gobbledygook and clichés, so naming food doesn’t appear to fall under their purview - their website makes no mention of their earlier comment. Interestingly, the incident exposed a different use of the word “ambient” by the food industry to mean “displaying at room temperature”, suitable for the surroundings, instead of evoking the creation of a relaxing atmosphere – a 2017 article in “The Grocer” magazine was headed “Country Choice launches 12-hour ambient life sausage roll”.

If this mistake had taken place in 2023, I am pretty sure the Co-Op’s social media accounts would have made hay while the sun shined, with a range of “ambient” products remaining on sale far longer. I just prefer it when having fun with language isn’t discouraged.

¹ A fried dish of mixed cabbage and cooked potato.

² Pilchard, egg and potato tie, served with a pastry crust that has the pilchard heads sticking out, preferably upwards. 

³ A pastry tube, not unlike a sausage roll, filled with meat, potato and onions, not unlike a pasty.