Hot Mettle
SOGAT, Murdoch and Me
Brenda Dean

The inspiring story of a woman in a man's world, fighting for the rights in which she has always believed, and rising to the top against the odds.

'We were beaten - that was the harsh truth of the matter. And somehow I had to persuade my members to face the fact that the union was at the end of the line. So was this the end of the line for Brenda Dean too? Was this how a career would conclude, which had gone from a junior secretary in a Lancashire print firm to becoming the first woman ever elected to lead a major British industrial trade union?'

At the age of sixteen Brenda Dean, along with many working-class girls from her part of Lancashire, left school and got a job as a secretary. Like them, she was hard-working and ambitious. Unlike the others, though, she went on to become the first woman leader of a major trade union - and then to smash several more glass ceilings throughout her career. Hot Mettle tells this fascinating story.

Brenda Dean was leader of the printers' union SOGAT when Rupert Murdoch started a bitter dispute by sensationally moving his newspapers without notice from Fleet Street to Wapping. She led negotiations, and Hot Mettle features previously unrevealed details of Brenda's battles with the Murdoch empire, including clandestine flights on Concorde to secret meetings in New York. Surprisingly, perhaps, the union leader and the mogul got on well together personally, despite the ferocity of their professional disputes.

After the year-long battle with the print bosses, the last major industrial clash in Britain, Brenda served on many major committees, including the Armed Forces Pay Review Body, the Housing Corporation, Freedom to Fly and the Royal Commission for House of Lords reform. Although she turned down the offer of a candidacy in safe Labour seat, she eventually made her mark in Parliament, becoming a very active 'working' peer.

'Because it is not what you expect to hear, it is unexpectedly refreshing' Daily Mail