Due to the lack of seats, the factory couldn’t sell any cars. We’d been shocked that Ford hadn’t come to us earlier to offer us any extra money, but that woke them up. Then Ford America sent a representative over to threaten the whole plant with closure, and they had to start taking it very seriously. They got in touch with Barbara Castle, because she was the employment secretary and it was her job to get us back in work.

Two coachloads of women, about 50 of us, went down to Whitehall to lobby, and eight women had a meeting with her. I stayed at home to look after my children. Barbara was very much on our side, and said she would speak to Ford, parliament and Harold Wilson [the prime minister at the time]. That’s when they came up with the deal, and the Equal Pay Act two years later - although Wilson said the country couldn’t afford to pay women the same as men. And it still can’t, can it?

We were a bit upset with the pay rise because it was only a percentage of what we’d asked for [the women were paid at 92% of the men’s salary, up from 85% before], and we still weren’t being recognised as skilled workers, which is what we were employed as.

Then the day we went back to work there wasn’t a word said to us - no ‘welcome back’ or ‘we’re pleased to see you’. Our supervisors gave us our work and that was that. It was like we’d never been out of the plant; it was just back to normal.

Despite that, I think most of us were pleased to go back to work – we’d never been on strike before, and we all enjoyed our jobs. There was usually a lovely, friendly atmosphere, and we would all chat with our friends during our breaks. It was nice and cheerful and we had lots of parties outside the plant. There were women who had worked there 40 years, and generations of families who had been at the factory for 100 years.

What it was really like to be a part of the Ford Dagenham strike