Till the Day I Die

Publisher Marketing: The book plots the life of a working class boy brought up on the dockside in Preston Lancashire in 1949 and who worked as a Youth In Training for the telephone department in the GPO. Initially wanting to be a professional footballer and playing for Bury & Blackpool Tony settled for playing part time for Fleetwood Town, Netherfield, Darwen and Accrington Stanley as well as England GPO in the Post Office European Cup in Oslo. Following a few years working on engineering work Tony got involved in trade union activities for the Post Office Engineering Union along with joining a number of Political Parties. The book is a humorous but factual attempt to highlight the amusing stories that becoming a trade union activist had to deal with, firstly in the old civil service environment and then after the company was privatised by the Thatcher Government in the 1980s. The various accounts tell of the union members who got into difficulties, managers who were difficult to deal with and of course the good times that were had making long term friendships and relationships. By taking notes of every meeting and collecting books, reams of papers relating to the events covered, the stories are all true and unbelievably did happen. Who would have thought a strike was fun? Who would have thought representing people in difficulty was fun? Who would have thought union meetings were fun? Read the book and you may just change your mind. The book is about giving people a laugh that does not exist as much in workplaces in these competitive days and hopefully this book will give happy memories to some people and highlight to others that being a trade union activist in the 1980s 90s and the new millenium was fun as well as being rewarding.