Interview with Jane Watts

Interview covers mid 1970s- 2018

Track 1: [00:02.21] Description of how Jane became involved in the co-op movement starting from her experiences at university in Durham and her work with York Community Book Shops. [00:07:37] Description on the structure of co-op, explanation of how decisions were made in the shop, involvement and connections to over co-op businesses and how the shop was run. [00:14:45] Description of what was stocked in the bookshop, how decisions were made over this. Talk about books being confiscated and the reaction of customs to gay and left wing literature, anecdote on the disagreement over Jack Kerouac's On The Road [00:20:34] Description of how wages were distributed and how the group attempted to fairly distribute the income, Jane uses the example of child allowance of those who were the primary carer for their children. Some talk on co-op learning from each other.[00:24:40] Description of the network between co-ops and the Federation of Alternative Bookshops, outlines some of the economic issues the co-op faced and brick throwing from the public over support of contentious issues such as Irish independence. Description of closing down the bookshop. [00:37:12] Description of involved in ICOM Women's Linkup and work in Leeds and Nottingham. Also description of Jane's work with Lynx Training [00:45:37] Description of a national Co-operative movement meeting, including discussion of differences between varies groups in terms of race, gender and structure. [00:52:18] Description of why the decision was made to shut down Lynx Training in 1998

Track 2: [00:00:01] Discusses the decision to shut down Lynx Training in more detail, briefly outlines material deposited to the National Co-operative Archive.

Track 3: [00:00:02] Discusses involvement in ICOM. [00:03:50] Discusses being chair of ICOM and its funding. [00:06:19] Talks about career post Lynx including work at the Co-operative College. [00:10:13] Outlines current thoughts on the worker co-op movement. [00:11:50] Discusses development of Lynx Training over time.

Jane Watts was a founder member of York Community Bookshop workers' co-operative in the mid 1970s-mid 1980s. Jane also worked with ICOM Women's Link-up in Nottingham, and briefly for ICOM in Leeds and West Yorkshire. In the 1990s Jane was involved in Lynx Training in Nottingham, a workers' co-operative which provided support for small businesses which closed in 1998.

(Interviewer) Philippa Lewis worked as the Project Archivist for the Working Together project (2017-2018) based at the National Co-operative Archive.

Some parts of interview redacted due to personal data.

In October 2017 the National Co-operative Archive sent out a request for interview participants from the wider workers' co-operative community to take part in Working Together, a Heritage Lottery Funded project seeking to record and preserve the heritage of the workers' co-operative movement. This interview was recorded in response to this request. The interview was conducted at Leicester Secular Hall.

Length of interview: 01:12:21

(Track 1 00:53:55 Track 2 00:03:17 Track 3 00:15:49)

Recording Equipment: Zoom H2 Handy recorder

Recording note: Original audio file WAV 48kHz/16 bit - Copy of audio file Mp3

This interview is licensed under a Creative Commons license (Attribution, Non-Commercial, No Derivatives)

Transcript and summary of interview.

Material related to Lynx Training referred to in the interview - available for consultation at the National Co-operative Archive. Reference GB 1499 LTL.

Original recording and transcript held at the National Co-operative Archive.