ABSTRACT
Most of the women agreed that the pace of work had become faster over the years. The light was flashing quicker, more trays had to be done, but there was less work to be done on each UMO. They also claimed that the conveyor belt itself moved faster, and jobs which used to be done by two people had gradually been turned into one-person jobs. My torquechecking job used to be separate from putting on the covers, but these had been combined. They said the speed used to be like the ‘lollipop’ job, the lightest job on our line; this was still a two-person job and an informal battle was going on to stop them turning it into a oneperson job. If Alice or Arlene was away, Eamonn would try and get one woman to make up covers for both the basic mechanism and transistors. If she did it he could claim it was a one-person job. They were always looking for ways to make you do more, like giving you labels to stick on, or diodes to make up, as well as your normal work.
