Fighting on for the victimised miners
Socialist Viewpoint1980sTranscribed by hand from the printed page.
ON January 1, 1986, almost 9 months after the end of the great miners strike of 1984/5, there were still 550 miners sacked and eight still in prison as a result of the strike. The imprisoned miners are: Terry French from Betteshanger, serving 4 years; Chris Tazey, Betteshanger (3 years); Clive Thompson, Frickly (3 years); Alan Sables, Armthorpe (18 months); David Gaunt, Shirebrook (2½ years); Sam Beardsman, Markham; and Russell Shankland and Dean Hancock from South Wales serving 8 years.
The labour movement has a clear responsibility not to turn its back on these miners victimised for putting up the greatest fight in defence of jobs seen anywhere in Europe since mass unemployment became a standard weapon to be used against the organised labour movement over the last 10 years.
These men are the symbol of the defeat of the strike. They have been used by the Coal Board and the government to punish the miners for the stand they made. Most of them are not only victimised in the short term, they are blacklisted in the long term — some probably for the rest of their lives.
Those who have turned their backs on this problem — both in the official movement and by withdrawal from the Support Groups — should think about what it means. This issue now goes far beyond the NUM. The ranks of victimised workers are growing all the time as other employers follow NCB methods. Silentnight and the Ffestiniog slate quarry strikes are examples of it.
If there is a lack of resolve on this issue in parts of the labour movement who should know better the NCB has not relaxed its line. Where there have been reinstatements they have been token. There have been no reinstatements in Kent. In Scotland and the Midlands miners who have won their cases at Industrial Tribunals are still not being reinstated. In Silverwood in South Yorkshire management said they would consider reinstatements if the pit improved its productivity. They withdrew this offer after the pit broke the European productivity record.
The NUM is fighting to defeat the UDM and to restore its bargaining power in the pits. Every issue including the wage review is used to pile on the pressure. The labour movement has a responsibility to support that struggle — not least by ensuring that the UDM is ostracised from the whole movement — trade unions and Labour Party at all levels. Arthur Scargill — who represents the best class struggle traditions of the strike — must be defended against a growing campaign against him within the NUM itself.
NUM activists need a new focus and organising centre for the left in the union after the open right wing role of the Communist Party during the strike and since. Groupings like the Yorkshire Miners Campaign Group need to be built and extended. Nor is there much time for this. NCB voluntary redundancy policy is being systematically and selectively used to tempt militant activists out of the industry and weaken the fight to re-establish the union.
Despite these problems, and pit closures which are taking place with sickening regularity, the basis for a fightback against the defeat of the strike is there. Des Dutfield, a militant during the strike, has won the presidency of the NUM in South Wales. The vast majority of militants who fought for the strike are still there. Many pits like Betteshanger in Kent are holding the line against closure. Horden in Durham has won a reprieve after a vigorous campaign; so has Darfield in Yorkshire, after battling against closure for months. It can be done and the fight has to be stepped up both organisationally and politically. The struggle needs to go beyond the present profitabilty arguments and back to the principles on which the strike was fought.
There are positive developments in the support movement as well. The National Co-ordinating Committee of Support Groups has been strongly established with about 25 to 30 active groups supporting it. Some groups are stepping up their activities or even coming back into existence. International support is building back up as well. A delegation from France — attending the last meeting of the Co-ordinating Committee — outlined a plan to establish a network of suport groups throughout France. There is talk of wide European co-ordination.
At the same time there has been a major development in the National Amnesty Campaign — now renamed the National Justice for Mineworkers Campaign.