The Mental Hospital and Institutional Workers' Union was a

trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Northwestern Europe, off the coast of European mainland, the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

. The union was established as the National Asylum Workers' Union in 1910Papers of the National Asylum Workers' Union and the Mental Hospital and Institutional Workers' Union held by Warwick University
/ref> by asylum attendants in

Lancashire Lancashire ( , ; abbreviated ''Lancs'') is a ceremonial county in North West England. It is bordered by Cumbria to the north, North Yorkshire and West Yorkshire to the east, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and the Irish Sea to ...

. George Gibson became its General Secretary in 1912, and served in post for the remainder of the union's existence. In 1918 it organised strikes at Prestwich Hospital,

Whittingham Hospital Whittingham Hospital was a psychiatric hospital in the parish of Whittingham, Lancashire, Whittingham, near Preston, Lancashire, England. The hospital opened in 1873 as the Fourth Lancashire County Asylum and grew to be the largest mental hospita ...

and Bodmin Hospital. It threatened to organise strikes in all the London asylums in support of a 48-hour week. In 1916, the union lost its membership in Southern Ireland to the

Irish Mental Hospital Workers' Union The Irish Mental Hospital Workers' Union was a trade union in Ireland. It was formed in 1912 as a split from the National Asylum Workers' Union, and it merged with the Transport and General Workers' Union in 1926. History The Irish Mental Hospit ...

. In 1931, it changed its name to the "Mental Hospital and Institutional Workers Union". In 1946, the union merged with the Hospital and Welfare Services Union to form the

Confederation of Health Service Employees The Confederation of Health Service Employees (COHSE) was a United Kingdom trade union representing workers primarily in the National Health Service. History The union was founded in 1946 with the merger of the Mental Hospital and Institutional ...

(COHSE). By this stage, it had secured a very high membership amongst mental hospital staff, including the vast majority of mental hospital nurses

References

External links

Catalogue of the MHIWU archives
held at the

Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick The Modern Records Centre (MRC) is the specialist archive service of the University of Warwick in Coventry, England, located adjacent to the Central Campus Library. It was established in October 1973 and holds the world's largest archive collect ...

Trade unions established in 1910 Trade unions disestablished in 1946 1946 disestablishments in the United Kingdom Defunct trade unions of the United Kingdom Healthcare trade unions in the United Kingdom 1910 establishments in the United Kingdom Former mental health organisations in the United Kingdom Trade unions based in Greater Manchester {{UK-trade-union-stub