Trade union membership badges

Trade union badges form a central part of the rich visual culture of the labour movement. Often taking their design from aspects of the larger and more intricate union emblems of the 19th century, or illustrating the tools of the union member’s trade, badges were first produced by trade unions as far back as the 1870s, and by the 1890s were routinely being issued by some unions to new members. While many unions opt simply to include their name on the badge (no mean feat given the number of words often involved), others go for an element of humour – the Association of Women Clerical Staff (AWCS) choosing an auk.

Typically made of good quality metal (steel or brass) and finally enamelled, the badges are made to last and are often manufactured by firms such as Fattorini, which has a long history of producing medals, civic insignia and even ceremonial swords. The badges shown below are a tiny sample of the enormous volume of different designs produced over the years. Wearing such badges, could, however, sometimes prove contentious, as the timeline below shows.

Many trade unions recognise the loyalty of long-term members with special badges that mark the number of years of their service to and support of the union. A small sample of these are shown below. The train drivers’ union, ASLEF, is especially diligent in this respect, producing badges that mark five years’ membership and which then run at five-year intervals all the way to fifty years’ membership.

Trade union badges timeline

1834 Grand National Consolidated Trades Union issues ribbons for members to wear at funerals. Designs for use in the centre of rosettes are referred to as “badges” and sold at a penny ha’penny.

1871 Amalgamated Association of Miners  produces metal badge bearing the union’s name, to be worn suspended from a white ribbon.

1879-82 Locomotive Steam Engine and Firemen’s Society (later ASLEF) issues silver watch-chain fob engraved with the initials of the union and of the owner, a shamrock, rose and thistle, and clasped hands.

1885 Amalgamated Society of Engineers produces badge to commemorate the start of work on the Manchester Ship Canal.

1890 National Amalgamated Society of Brass Workers issues large brass medal to commemorate a strike.

1891 Derbyshire miners’ officials wear “handsome gilt badges” with the motto “united we stand, divided we fall”.
Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants for Scotland commemorates a strike with gold, silver and bronze medallions for use as watch-chain fobs.

1893 Amalgamated Society of Engineers issues badge to its delegates to the Trades Union Congress.

1901 Earliest known Trades Union Congress badge known to have survived – in the Unison Collection.

1904 Earliest badge marking Trades Union Congress to be found in the TUC Collection.

1905 TUC issues porcelain badge for delegates to Congress held at in the Potteries at Hanley, Stoke on Trent.

1912 Thousands of workers join a five-week general strike in Brisbane, Australia after members of the Australian Tramway Employees Association are dismissed for wearing their union badges to work. The tramway workers are not reinstated until the Queensland Government acquires the tram system in 1922.

1913 London bus and tube services close down when transport workers strike in support of 12 drivers and conductors suspended by bus operator Tillings for wearing their union badges. The strike was settled after arbitration and led to recognition for the London and Provincial Union of Licensed Vehicle Workers.

1918 Members of the National Asylum Workers Union at Bodmin walk out after five nurses are dismissed for wearing their union badge while on duty. All are eventually reinstated and win the right to wear their badge.

1920 Messrs J Llyons & Co dismisses Mrs Sparkes, a long-serving member of the catering staff at its flagship teashop on the Strand, for wearing her United Catering Trade Union badge. Around 4,000 “teashop girls” and kitchen workers walk out. Some 1,200 march along the Embankment behind a band to demonstrate outside the Strand Corner House.

1984 Year-long miners’ strike leads to a resurgence in trade union badges, with lodges and areas of the National Union of Mineworkers, and support groups, issueing strike badges to raise funds. 

2005 Dunnes Stores sacks Dublin shopworker Joanne Delaney for wearing the badge of her union, Mandate. She is reinstated after a Europe-wide email campaign and winning support from Members of the Scottish Parliament.