jailed as a result of their picketing activities. The longest sentences were given to Ricky Tomlinson, a plasterer and TGWU strike leader, and Des Warren, a steel fixer and leading lay official of UCATT, who became known as the "Shrewsbury Two". At Shrewsbury Crown Court, they refused to testify against fellow strikers. Charges of affray were dropped, but they were found guilty of "conspiracy to intimidate" under the Conspiracy Act 1875, which had not been used for 98 years. Warren was sentenced to three years in prison, and Tomlinson to two. Des Warren subsequently developed serious health problems, which Tomlinson attributes to the medication he took whilst in solitary confinement. Tomlinson took the case to the TUC Annual Congress with others in 1975, with little result. In 2004, Des Warren died, without the pardon that his family had campaigned for. In 2012 Tomlinson and others sought to have the convictions overturned by the Criminal Cases Review Commission. In 2013 a paper petition was launched, alongside the existing e-petition, for an Early Day Motion by MP John McDonnell to be brought. In May 2020, the Criminal Cases Review Commission referred a number of convictions relating to the Shrewsbury dispute, including that of Ricky Tomlinson, to the Court of Appeal. In March 2021, the Court of Appeal overturned the convictions of Tomlinson, Warren and the other members of the ‘Shrewsbury 24’ who had been convicted in relation to the 1972 industrial action. 1980s–90s: recession and recovery During the late 1980s and early 1990s, UCATT suffered a long debilitating decline, with successive attacks from a hostile Conservative government. The union faced mounting financial deficits from falling membership rolls, having been reliant upon cash contributions from members collected on site in the age of increasing technology. This decline also coincided with strong rumours of a merger with other unions, notably the TGWU, and gains being made by GMB. During this period, a strong Joint Sites Committee movement of rank and file UCATT, TGWU, GMB and AEEUW members characterised the construction unions' work on sites in major cities, many of whom had remained crowded, unsafe, and casualised places in need of true reform. In 1990, Albert Williams convinced the union to for the first time unionise self-employed labourers (the "lump"), but his unpopular proposal to merge the union into the Electrical, Electronic, Telecommunications and Plumbing Union led to his suspension by the union's executive, and