Rupert's Reward Rupert Murdock anti-newspaper ownership trade union protest poster / flyer - Boycott The Sun, News Of The World, The Sunday Times

“Rupert’s Reward – The Sack!” trade-union campaign poster from 1986 attacking Rupert Murdoch and News International during the bitter Wapping newspaper dispute. The caricature depicts Murdoch holding a money bag while declaring that his newspaper workers had made him millions in profit, only for their reward to be dismissal. Below, the poster calls on trade unionists to show solidarity by boycotting The Sun, News of the World, The Times and The Sunday Times. The dispute erupted in January 1986 after News International transferred production of its four national newspapers from traditional Fleet Street premises to a heavily secured, computerised printing plant at Wapping in East London. Murdoch sought new working practices based on modern direct-input and printing technology, reducing dependence on the powerful print unions and labour-intensive hot-metal production. When negotiations broke down, around 5, 500 production and clerical workers were dismissed after taking industrial action. SOGAT and the National Graphical Association organised pickets and a consumer boycott, while the new plant continued operating with a replacement workforce. Wapping became known as “Fortress Wapping” as mass pickets confronted large police deployments, and more than 1, 200 arrests were recorded during the year-long dispute. The strike lasted 54 weeks before ending in defeat in February 1987. Its consequences were profound: Fleet Street’s traditional print-union power was broken, computerised newspaper production accelerated, thousands of skilled jobs disappeared and Murdoch strengthened his control of British newspaper publishing. This poster captures the workers’ interpretation of the conflict: a wealthy proprietor enriching himself through newspaper profits while rewarding a loyal workforce with dismissal. It remains a potent record of union resistance, media ownership, technological change, mass redundancy, press power and industrial relations in Thatcher-era Britain.