SMARTLY dressed in suits, jackets and, in most cases, ties, they seemed the unlikeliest bunch of strikers.

In the 1970s Oxford was well used to seeing pickets barricading the gates at the Morris Motors and Pressed Steel car factories at Cowley as yet another strike took place.

But this walkout involved what one might consider the most docile and least militant of workers – insurance agents.

The pickets assembled outside Marigold House at Carfax in June 1970 to air their grievances at their employers, the Co-operative Insurance Society.

More than 7,800 of the society’s agents – members of the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (USDAW) – supported the strike nationwide over a claim for better expenses allowances.

But only one of the 30 agents employed at the Oxford office was supporting the strike – the others were members of a breakaway group not involved in the dispute.

According to union official Mr HE Moran, the Oxford office was the “only blackspot” in the south.

So the union organised a group of flying pickets from outside the city to descend on Marygold House to make their feelings known.

One agent, John Russell, even turned up on his bike, the traditional mode of transport for insurance agents as they called at homes to collect premiums.

They might have been on strike but they were determined not to let their sartorial standards slip!

When this picture was taken, the pickets probably found they had picked the wrong day. Although office staff were working inside, all the agents were out on their rounds.

However, there was likely to be a confrontation – and more than a few words exchanged – the following day when Oxford agents were due to arrive to pay in the money they had collected.

From the strike placards, it appeared that the Co-op paid a cycle allowance but not a car allowance and the union was demanding £3 a week.

A member of the Oxford staff told the Oxford Mail that work was continuing as usual in the Oxford office and the pickets were not causing embarrassment.

He said the agents had decided not to support the strike. The one union member belonging to the union was not at work and officially on holiday.

The society had told the union it was willing to go to arbitration over the claim but not under the threat of a strike.

* Note the sign on the side of the building for Martins Bank, a Liverpool-based private bank with a logo of a grasshopper, whose roots can be traced back in 1583. It became part of Barclays Bank in 1969.