Declassified Documents Confirm Thatcher Strategy Against Num

[Shake me up Judy]

Some good points made by everyone. Certainly by the 1970's, the unions had lost the plot and actually betrayed the long history of the labour movement, but it was the failure of management and governments long before this that was responsible for Britain's industrial decline. The abuse of power by unions in the 1970's doesn't explain the demise of some of our key industries from at least the 1930's onwards, and the poor leadership that nearly lost us WW2 before the Americans bailed us out in the West and the USSR crushed the Nazi war machine.

 

The police's job is to enforce the law, not to be used as strike-breakers. I think this was partly MacGregor's idea; to use American police tactics from the 1920's against striking workers. I feel sure that he would have armed the police had the government (and the police) allowed him.

 

Anyway, the miners strike was a turning point and Britain's never been the same since. In my view we're a poorer country now.

[pongo]

> Mick Hume's excellent 2009 article Remembering Britain’s forgotten civil war at Spiked.

[Barrie Stevens]

Also little mentioned but on the go at the time were talks and agreements whereby those countries such as Britain and others effectively running old fashioned deep mined coal systems needing preferential treatment/subsidy would agree to close them and open up to economically mined coal from major producers whose product had hitherto been shut out or restricted. ie South Africa, Colombia, Australia etc The price was access to their markets for more up-market industrial goods and financial services. I think there was eventually a treaty under General Agreement on Tariff and Trade. This required a lot of Old World mines to close and it was thus inevitable for international reasons that the NUM was defeated before the GATT treaty could be implemented. Whilst not reported on domestic media it was covered by BBC World Service at the time.....

[GD4ELI]

Anyway, the miners strike was a turning point and Britain's never been the same since. In my view we're a poorer country now.

 

I experienced the change from Labour to Conservative in 1979. Labour's spending was totally out of control, inflation rampant, the unions ran the show. Dennis Healey ran out of money.

 

One thing MT did was to get government running the country and she also gave the country a huge kick up the backside.

 

I believe that the UK is far, far better for her leadership.

[ballaughbiker]

Whilst it was no excuse for what eventually happened, many of these deep mines had been going for >100 years and were exhausted anyway. There would have been many closures for this reason alone.

 

One colliery I know of (Williamthorpe in North Derbyshire) was still using steam power to haul up the coal into the late 60s....

[ballaughbiker]

Dennis Healey ran out of money

Some say Socialist governments always do. In fact wasn't it MT who said Labour eventually run out of someone else's money.

 

I think many who write off everything done by Thatcher as bad have selective or poor memories. Britain was a laughing stock at the end of the 70s following Wilson's and Sunny Jim's "leadership". Remember the winter of discontent?

 

I often wonder what would have happened if Michael Foot had ever been pm.

[GD4ELI]

 

Dennis Healey ran out of money

Some say Socialist governments always do. In fact wasn't it MT who said Labour eventually run out of someone else's money.

 

I think many who write off everything done by Thatcher as bad have selective or poor memories. Britain was a laughing stock at the end of the 70s following Wilson's and Sunny Jim's "leadership". Remember the winter of discontent?

 

I often wonder what would have happened if Michael Foot had ever been pm.

 

Agreed. Britain was a total joke, MT restored pride in the country. Remember MT & Ronald Regan together holding up the alliance against the Soviet Block? She also gained great respect from the Soviets and thank God put an end to the old-style Labour governments.

[Chinahand]

I don't really know what to make of this and it would take some proper journalism/a historian to sort it out - something the BBC and press seem unable to do.

 

I suspect both sides were spinning: one side to reduce the extent of the planned closures, the other to emphasize them.

 

Scargill emphasized total closures and claimed they had already been picked. 75 pits.

 

The coal board emphasized yearly pit closures and said it would be done via an on-going review of performance. Lord Armstrong basically admits this in this BBC story. 20 or so pits a year = 60 pits. So the Coal Board were underplaying as they'd told the government that they aspired to shut down 75 in the 3 years 83-85 - and extra 5 per year.

 

It is interesting to actually look at how many they did shut down - LINK

 

It took until 1989 before 75 pits were actually closed down - with the strike only 2 were closed down in 1984, 23 in 1985 and 17 in 1986, 8 in 1987.

 

That is less than they'd planned and they did not do what they had told they government they were planning to do - erm could this have anything to do with them doing it on a case by case basis dependent on performance?

 

With the Coal Board dominant and the NUM defeated you'd expect them to do what they wanted to do - so about 20 a year dependent on the economics of individual pits. That is what happened and isn't so different from what was said.

 

Some historian is going to have to dig out what people actually said in the 1980s - I very much doubt the Coal Board said only 20 pits would be closed in total ever. They would have had weasel words about current closures plans (20 or so) and any future ones would be dependent on the economics of the pits.

 

That was basically true and basically what happened.

 

Scargill was no fool and knew the writing was on the wall - he tried to insist on no closures etc. The Coal Board basically did what it had planned to do.

 

I don't think this is a huge story, but the emotions about these times are still so raw it sells papers as people rehearse their political biases. Hey ho!

 

I'm biased - you can't keep throwing money away supporting industries which have no economic purpose.

[Shake me up Judy]

Yes, we have a much better energy industry now don't we. Marvellous.

[GD4ELI]

Yes, we have a much better energy industry now don't we. Marvellous.

 

Indeed 'we' do. Remember 1973?

[woolley]

 

Dennis Healey ran out of money

Some say Socialist governments always do. In fact wasn't it MT who said Labour eventually run out of someone else's money.

 

I think many who write off everything done by Thatcher as bad have selective or poor memories. Britain was a laughing stock at the end of the 70s following Wilson's and Sunny Jim's "leadership". Remember the winter of discontent?

 

I often wonder what would have happened if Michael Foot had ever been pm.

Yes. It was ripe for sorting out. What credibility did the Labour government have in 1979 when the unions were in open revolt with their own political wing? Many mistakes were made in the eighties of course but that was the start of the grand plan/disaster that is globalisation.

[pongo]

 

 

 

 

Dennis Healey ran out of money

Some say Socialist governments always do. In fact wasn't it MT who said Labour eventually run out of someone else's money.

 

I think many who write off everything done by Thatcher as bad have selective or poor memories. Britain was a laughing stock at the end of the 70s following Wilson's and Sunny Jim's "leadership". Remember the winter of discontent?

 

I often wonder what would have happened if Michael Foot had ever been pm.

 

 

Yes. It was ripe for sorting out. What credibility did the Labour government have in 1979 when the unions were in open revolt with their own political wing? Many mistakes were made in the eighties of course but that was the start of the grand plan/disaster that is globalisation.

 

 

The so called "Winter of Discontent" was the result of the Labour govt introducing public sector pay cuts in order to control inflation. Healey (like Thatcher obviously but also, arguably, Marx) was a monetarist. The Labour govt was voted out for attempting to introduce the very policies which the Conservative govt then implemented.

 

Labour and Conservative govts back to WW2 had implemented broadly similar policies - because full employment and the social contract were part of the Labour-Conservative consensus which Attlee and Churchill had forged (friends and both fiercely anti-Moscow). By the late 70s the consensus was shifting.

 

The economy was broken, and has remained broken ever since, because of a lack of investment. And because economies are largely about cycles which govts can do very little to influence. Since 1979 the UK economy has been no more or less stable than it was during the 1970s - though the fact that sterling more or less shadows the € has certainly made export trade much less unpredictable.

 

Today, like in the 1970s, Labour and the Conservatives are more or less the same. And just like then it is still all about personalities. Though the personalities are much smaller today.

 

PS - I believe that lots of people voted Tory in 1979 because they were basically social-climbers. They kind of liked the idea of moving over to what they wrongly perceived as being the posh people party. The same trend which resulted in people stone-cladding their semi !

[chuter ede]

Unfortunately none of us will probably be alive when the Profumo scandal documents are released sometime in the 2040's

[Non-Believer]

The pit closures (and odd privatisation) continued up until the early nineties under Major. I can remember Michael Heseltine, when asked for justification of the closure of a particular pit, saying, "You have to remember, the miners brought down a Conservative Government" (being Heath's).

 

Revenge was sweet for some........

[ballaughbiker]

Question is how many would still be open if Scargill hadn't taken on Thatcher or Foot had won the 83 election? One or two other countries have closed most of their pits now.