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This conference for trade unionists was one of many regional initiatives in the mid and late 1980s. It brought together local trade unionists and anti-apartheid activists. The conference focused on campaigning for sanctions and the role of the ANC in South Africa and SWAPO in Namibia.

Report of the third biennial conference of Local Authority Action Against Apartheid (LAAA), held in Glasgow in February 1987. LAAA was set up at a conference held in Sheffield in 1983.

In 1987 the AAM called for ‘people’s sanctions’ in response to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s determination to oppose all sanctions measures against South Africa. In March 1987 it organised a month of local action when local AA groups targeted British companies with a big stake in the South African economy, like Standard Chartered Bank and RTZ. The highlight of the month was the launch of the Boycott Shell campaign on 1 March. This poster was used by local AA groups to advertise events in their own localities.

After the publication of its Manifesto for Sanctions in 1987, the AAM organised a March Month of People’s Sanctions. Hundreds of thousands of this leaflet were distributed during the month by local anti-apartheid groups. Action days focused on companies like Standard Chartered Bank on 4 March and the mining company RTZ on 9 March. The campaign culminated in a National Convention for Sanctions on 27 June.

On 1 March 1987 the AAM launched a boycott of Shell as part of an international campaign. Shell was joint owner of one of South Africa’s biggest oil refineries and a lead company in South Africa’s coalmining and petrochemicals industries. During the March Month of People’s Sanctions activists picketed Shell garages all over Britain. The photo shows Frances Morrell, Leader of the ILEA (Inner London Education Authority) with David Haslam from Embargo outside a Shell garage in north London with a mock gun symbolising Shell’s support for the South African Defence Force. Embargo was a co-ordinating group campaigning against oil supplies to South Africa.

On 1 March 1987 the AAM launched a boycott of Shell as part of an international campaign organised with groups in the USA and the Netherlands. Shell was joint owner of one of South Africa’s biggest oil refineries. It was a lead company in South Africa’s coalmining and petrochemicals industries. During the March Month of People’s Sanctions activists picketed Shell garages all over Britain. The photograph shows members of the local Liberal Party picketing a Shell garage in Hackney, north London.

Leaflet for a demonstration outside South Africa House publicising the case of the Sharpeville Six. The six, five men and one woman, were sentenced to death in December 1985 after joining a demonstration at which a black deputy mayor was killed. For the next two and a half years Southern Africa the Imprisoned Society (SATIS) mounted an international campaign for their release. As a result of the campaign and protests from inside South Africa, they were reprieved in July 1988.

In March 1986 members of the British NUR set up Rail Against Apartheid to mobilise support among British railwaymen for the South African Rail and Harbour Workers Union (SARHWU). This report by two Rail Against Apartheid members who visited South Africa on a fact-finding mission was written in the aftermath of SARHWU’s three-month strike in 1987 during which six South African railworkers were shot dead by police. The report details the practical support given by the NUR to SARHWU and Rail Against Apartheid’s involvement in wider AAM campaigns for the isolation of apartheid South Africa.