Tom Driver

Tom Driver (9 September 1912–4 November 1988) was a British trade unionist.

Born in Kexborough near Barnsley, Driver studied at the University of Sheffield, where he edited the student newspaper, ran the Socialist Club, and joined the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). After university, he returned to Kexborough, where he picked potatoes and ran the local Labour Party, then became a French teacher and an activist in the National Union of Teachers. He later moved to work at Doncaster College, where he joined the Association of Teachers in Technical Institutes, and was elected President in 1960, then General Secretary in 1969. Under his leadership, the union negotiated a merger with the Association of Teachers in Colleges and Departments of Education, forming the National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education, and persuading members to affiliate the union to the Trades Union Congress.^[1]

Following his retirement in 1978, Driver was active in the pensioners' movement and sided with the Morning Star during the CPGB split of the 1980s.^[1]

References

1. "Driver Tom", Compendium of Communist Biography