El Círculo Lautaro, First Chilean Refugee organisation in Glasgow, our Folk Group and the Roll-Royce workers boycott in EastKillBride

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Soon after arrival in Glasgow, there were a lot of get-togethers among Chileans and innumerable meetings with the “gringos”.

Chilean political parties in exile began to take shape soon after arrival, with their supporters joining in. As Chileans, the first task was to formalise our group of exiles in a committee which we called El Círculo Lautaro. “Lautaro” was an astute Indian chief involved in the resistance against the Spanish conquistadores in Chile during the 16th century. We thought that the name was appropriate for our committee as it represented, democratically, all Chileans in Glasgow. Two communist “compañeros”, Mario Concha and Luis Machiavello were given the task of writing the statutes for our “círculo”. These sophisticated statutes, written in Spanish in December of 1974, and of which I still have a copy, were discussed, corrected and approved in a general assembly.

As soon as we arrived we had our first unitarian
document of our organization we called: "Circulo chileno Lautaro".
It was presented by two Chilean refugees at a general meeting in December of 1974 in Drumchapel. Glasgow

Political parties in exile.

These Chilean political parties had their own agenda and code of conduct in relation to their political involvement in our circulo. As I did not belong to any particular party, I responded to the challenge of the circulo by forming a Chilean Folk Group to do Solidarity work. This effort was much appreciated by the “politicos” as a good tool to support the solidarity work in Britain. The circulo was headed by a “Secretario General” Ivan Hastre, living at 75 Inchfad Drive-Drumchapel, Glasgow. (Ivan was a member of the “Partido Radical tercer congreso”).

Our Chilean Folk Group

The statutes of our circulo were intended to achieve two goals: to try to solve by ourselves any domestic problems arising in our community and to support the work of the Chile Solidarity Campaign. That was to co-ordinate, with our “gringo” friends in the solidarity Campaign, all activities related to solidarity with the People of Chile. There was one statute which dealt exclusively with our commitment to contribute some of our scarce money to the circulo with the aim of helping compañeros who might be in need.

One important activity carried out by el Circulo Lautaro in 1975 was to organize the solidarity week in Glasgow from the 3rd to the 8thth of March and, to coincide with it, they organised from the 7th to the 9th of March a “congreso”, a meeting involving all the representatives of the Chilean refugee organisations in Great Britain. This meeting to be held “in front of the river Clyde” was in accordance with an agreement taken in the previous meeting held in January in Durham.

The debates at the congress were centred in a study about the work being done by the British Solidarity Committees, and the work being done by the Chilean committees in Britain. It was going to focus on its relationship with the unions and related themes, dealing with a variety of themes: boycotts, national debt, demonstrations, campaigns carried out by Chilean committees in Britain, propaganda work, political education, relationship with the media and cultural matters.

For the 7th of March it organised performances by a Chilean folk group (Myself, Tulio and Hugo) and a Scottish folk group, presumably The Laggan leaded by the singer Arthur Johnstone.

Below: the Programme of Activities of the Círculo Lautaro in Glasgow involving, among several activities, a meeting in front of the main entrance of the Roll Royce Plant to meet the gentlemen below.

Four of the Roll Royce trade unionists at East Kilbride, who in 1974 refused to carry out repair work for warplanes engines belonging to the Chilean Air Force. They did it in protest against the Pinochet dictatorship. In a rainy night,our Chilean Folk Group and some members of the Glasgow Chilean Solidarity Campaign went to East Kilbride to thank, give moral support and validates, with our presence, the importance of their support. Solidarity with the People of Chile in those days was very strong with many activities carried out by us (the Chilean refugees community in Scotland) and the Chilean Solidarity Campaign in Scotland. Today, 2018, these coraugeus people are celebrated and the subject of a documetary film .

The programme of activities of the Círculo Lautaro in Glasgow

Monday 3rd of March.

At 12,30

The Scottish Trade Centre.

Presentation of the Chilean Band, (this was myself, Hugo and Tulio)

playing typical Latin-American songs.

Directors of the Círculo Lautaro will be present.

From 2, 30 to 7, 30

The Glasgow University central building

Exhibition of Chilean posters

At 17, 00

Queen Margaret Union

Film about the Chilean situation

Tuesday 4th of March

From 10.00 to 18.00

The Glasgow University central building

Exhibition of Chilean Posters

At 12.45

At the Roll Royce Plant

Meeting in front of the main entrance

At 13 .00

(The workers of the Roll Royce Plant were refusing to repair the engines belonging to the war-airplane of the Chilean Air Forces. We were also asked to play music to the workers in their place of work in East Kilbride.)*

Queen Margaret Union

Film about the Chilean situation

At 18, 00

Trades Council, East Kilbride *

Reception with the Chilean Band (this was myself, Hugo and Tulio)

At 19, 30

Murray Hall

Presentation of the Chilean Band (this was myself, Hugo and Tulio)

Wednesday 5th of March

From 14, 30 to 19, 00

Clyde University (It must be understood as Strathclyde University)

Exhibition of Chilean posters

At 17, 00

Clyde University

Film about the Chilean situation

Thursday 6th of March

From 10, 00 to 18, 00

Clyde University

Exhibition of Chilean Posters

At 13, 00

Clyde University

Film about the Chilean situation

Friday 7th of March

From 12, 00 to 19, 00

Trade Unions Centre

Exhibition of Chilean Posters

At 19, 30

Trade Unions Centre

Film about the Chilean situation

Saturday 8th of March

At 10, 30

Participation in the demonstration for

International Women’s Day.

Speech by a Chilean comrade.

From 13, 30 to 15 00

Saint Enoch Station

Picket and Exhibition of Chilean Posters

* The Chilean engines belonging to the Chilean Air Force in need of repairs were Hawker Hunters bombers which used Roll- Royce engines. On the 11th of September of 1973 bombed The Presidential Palace in Santiago. An scene, I witnessed from a long distance.