The Miner's Strike of 1984

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the major industrial action that many regard as a watershed moment in British industrial relations.

I was reminded of this occasion by a discussion programme on BBC radio 4 this morning in which several protagonists from either side of the picket lines sat down and talked about their experience of the strike

Now I know it is Wikipedia and may well contain inaccuracies and downright lies but this link does at least give a flavour of what the dispute was like.

We could argue until we are blue in the face about this whole event.  The whys and wherefores are well documented but I just wanted to add my personal perspective and opinion.

"Battle of Orgreave"

I was at sixth form college at the time, in the relatively prosperous part of southern Hampshire. I was enjoying a safe middle class upbringing. It would be safe to say there was not a lot of sympathy for the miner's actions during this period. I failed to understand how the fabled "Battle Of Orgreave" ever got to take place in a country that considered itself civilised. 

I lived a long way from the coal mining industries, well in English terms my nearest coal mine was 100 miles away which might of well been a continent away. As a result the hardship of the mining communities was not felt in my neck of the woods. There was real hardship. 

What really astounded me in later years was just how much these communities had become embattled and impoverished. This was more than just a chance to take on the government. These people staked their livelihoods. 

The decimation of the coal mining industry happened almost exactly as the NUM said it would.

You may feel that it was the right or natural way and you might not.

I was never a Thatcher supporter and certainly not a Conservative government voter.

Ted Heath

I was disappointed. It seemed to me at the time that the people at the centre of the dispute were pawns in a power game played between the NUM and the government. A miners strike in the early 1970's had effectively brought down the the Conservative government led by Ted Heath. The Thatcher government took a view that never again would the government be held to ransom by the unions. Vast resources were thrown at the policing of the strike. I used to know rank and file officers in Portsmouth who had extensions/conservatories even whole goddamn houses paid for out of the overtime earnt during the dispute. 

The government of the day willed the hardship on these people. They chose to take this route of direct confrontation. As did the NUM. I still unsure today as to whether Arthur Scargill was political dreamer if you like. Believing he would have the power to take on the government in an old fashioned workers revolution like in the early 20th century. He most certainly had the backing of the miners themselves who were fighting for their livelihoods. On the former Orgreave mine site a B&Q depot now sits. Not quite the same sort of employment opportunity. But the between them they fiddled whilst Rome burnt. Real people suffered for the political ideals of these two groups

Once the mines were closed the communities around them died slow long lingering deaths. The reason for the towns and villages ceased to exist and nothing was put in place to support these areas. The fears of these miners were realised in full. 

Payback for 1972?