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1984 Miners Strike.....
They went on strike at the start of spring after giving the governement enough warning to stock pile coal. So the miners suffered a lot of hardship and the strike had 0 effect on power generation. So why do they hate Mrs Thatcher, surely it was the stupidity of their own leader, Mr Scargill that is to blame for all their problems for no actual benefit at all. Into the valley of death Scargill forced his troops, of course he stayed behind on full pay from the Union! I cannot see for the life of me how any miner can blame MrsT. Is there an objective thought between them?
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what I mean OG is that at the time NUM had all the union legislation on their side and if they'd been wise and used the standard playbook for coal strikes then they would have made much more fight of it. The governement was new untested in union disputes the NUM among others where battle hardened strikers.
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Well the people in Glasgow didn't like Maggie - catch the video here
http://
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She sold the 'family' silver by privatising state-run utilities such as British Gas, British Telecom, following by electricity and airlines.//
Selling the family silver ? That would be difficult , there wasn't any to sell .
Each one was heavily subsidised . to the tune of tens of millions every day.
Had they been making money do you think she would have sold them ?
Half the miners in this country refused to join the strike and carried on working. That's why Scargill didn't call a ballot.
Most of the mines were clapped out and at the end of their lives . The Coal Board virtually gave them away to any miners who said they were viable. So called management buy outs and they all failed. Since then were they re-opened by Labour or ex-miners ? No way !
//Remember, it wasn't only the miners that Maggie 'screwed'. She wrecked the lives of many in the printing industry too. //
Oh and how did she do that ? It was never owned by the state .
The reason why the print industry went into decline was because the unions refused to use the new technology , computers and colour, . They insisted on keeping the old 100 year old labour intensive setting all the type by hand . Nothing to do with MT. It was Eddie Shaw who revolutionised printing and moved out of Fleet Street, where his works had to be protected from the Luddites.
//Although I liked her I think selling our utilities was a big big mistake, they should have been kept state run. //
Why should we taxpayers support inefficient industries , unless there is no alternative.
She sold the 'family' silver by privatising state-run utilities such as British Gas, British Telecom, following by electricity and airlines.//
Selling the family silver ? That would be difficult , there wasn't any to sell .
Each one was heavily subsidised . to the tune of tens of millions every day.
Had they been making money do you think she would have sold them ?
Half the miners in this country refused to join the strike and carried on working. That's why Scargill didn't call a ballot.
Most of the mines were clapped out and at the end of their lives . The Coal Board virtually gave them away to any miners who said they were viable. So called management buy outs and they all failed. Since then were they re-opened by Labour or ex-miners ? No way !
//Remember, it wasn't only the miners that Maggie 'screwed'. She wrecked the lives of many in the printing industry too. //
Oh and how did she do that ? It was never owned by the state .
The reason why the print industry went into decline was because the unions refused to use the new technology , computers and colour, . They insisted on keeping the old 100 year old labour intensive setting all the type by hand . Nothing to do with MT. It was Eddie Shaw who revolutionised printing and moved out of Fleet Street, where his works had to be protected from the Luddites.
//Although I liked her I think selling our utilities was a big big mistake, they should have been kept state run. //
Why should we taxpayers support inefficient industries , unless there is no alternative.
I remember the miners' strike like it was yesterday, but from a different perspective.
I was personally threatened because I refused to give money to the strike fund and my sister went through hell.
She was recovering from a partial mastectomy after a cancer scare so her husband, a policeman, was not sent to the picket lines until a couple of weeks after her op.
She was worried sick about him every day, and no, he wasn't one of the Met coppers bragging about the overtime, he was a local bobby who had to keep on with his job after the strike was over.
I was personally threatened because I refused to give money to the strike fund and my sister went through hell.
She was recovering from a partial mastectomy after a cancer scare so her husband, a policeman, was not sent to the picket lines until a couple of weeks after her op.
She was worried sick about him every day, and no, he wasn't one of the Met coppers bragging about the overtime, he was a local bobby who had to keep on with his job after the strike was over.
brenden This isn't the first time Scargill has been in trouble with the NUM , at the time of the miners strike he bought a house for himself and his deputy using the miners pension fund.
When it was discovered he claimed he had only borrowed the money.
Subsequently he got a morgage but it was claimed, for 5 years the union paid the morgage.
When it was discovered he claimed he had only borrowed the money.
Subsequently he got a morgage but it was claimed, for 5 years the union paid the morgage.
Propaganda - whoever said that what a delusional comment to make. The mining, steel, car and Post Office Telephone businesses were so out of line from cost structures as well as quality and customer service. Take the phones, you were lucky to get a line if you requested one within 3 months. Someone who I was talking with last night in the pub, said he set up a business in New Bond Street and had to wait six months for the first line and over a year for the second line in. It was a joke - strip away all the subsidies and all of them were at least 30 per cent out of line with Europe. What Thatcher arrested was the result of several decades of mismanagement starting from WW2 and perhaps before.....
It wasn't just the Unions either - British management was largely inward looking, over-staffed and pompous, no sense of human relations or even what marketing and selling actually entailed. There were no business schools or commercial degrees other than accountancy back then........
It wasn't just the Unions either - British management was largely inward looking, over-staffed and pompous, no sense of human relations or even what marketing and selling actually entailed. There were no business schools or commercial degrees other than accountancy back then........
it wasn't that simple blue toffee. when the NUM previously tried (and failed) to push through a series of wage reforms, Joe Gormley devolved the decisions to each of the regions, and that action was upheld later by the courts. Because the NUM regions had that degree of autonomy, different areas had different conditions and some were in a better position than others when it came to vulnerability to closures.
To have called a national ballot under those circumstances may have resulted in safer areas balloting the others out of a job; plus to have taken the time to hold the ballot may have left the more vulnerable pits liable to close before the action could begin. instead, Scargill took the only other course available - following Gormley's earlier action (upheld by the courts) and leaving the regions to start their own action.
To have called a national ballot under those circumstances may have resulted in safer areas balloting the others out of a job; plus to have taken the time to hold the ballot may have left the more vulnerable pits liable to close before the action could begin. instead, Scargill took the only other course available - following Gormley's earlier action (upheld by the courts) and leaving the regions to start their own action.
blue toffee //I suspect he would have won, and then Mrs T's hand would have been forced.//
The midland miners made it clear before hand that they would not back any strike. They didn't and later formed their own union which still exists as do all their viable mines.
You really must be a dedicated socialist if you think Maggie would have backed down . Apart from gas there was and is plenty of cheap coal in the world. She imported it from Poland and Russia.
Scargill was desperate he even pleaded with the Russians to support
him and they refused.
The midland miners made it clear before hand that they would not back any strike. They didn't and later formed their own union which still exists as do all their viable mines.
You really must be a dedicated socialist if you think Maggie would have backed down . Apart from gas there was and is plenty of cheap coal in the world. She imported it from Poland and Russia.
Scargill was desperate he even pleaded with the Russians to support
him and they refused.
“She wrecked the lives of many in the printing industry too.”
I knew family members who worked in the print in the 70s and 80s, sir.prize. Believe me they had among the most highly paid, highly sought after jobs among unskilled/semi-skilled workers in the country. They followed “Spanish Practices” that would seem incredible today and the only way in to those jobs was by positions being handed down from father to son (certainly not to daughter). They had ample opportunity to reform and chose industrial strife instead. Mrs Thatcher did not wreck their lives, they wrecked them all by themselves.
The “Print” was one of the many industries hide-bound by Trades Unions who, as has been pointed out, would accept no compromise, no modernisation, no changes and wanted huge pay rises in return for their “co-operation“. As I said in reply to another question, by the end of the 1970s most people in the UK were sick and tired of waking up every morning in the knowledge that workers in one or more of the services on which they depended for a civilised existence had embarked on “industrial action” (a misnomer if ever there was one). The question posed about whether Mrs T would have won the 1979 election if the electorate knew what was to take place is very appropriate. The answer, without any doubt in my view, is that indeed she would. Believe me, I was there. It was an absolute nightmare and most people craved for change. They wanted an end to successive Prime Ministers inviting Union barons to No.10 for beer and sandwiches to discuss what sort of double digit pay rise they would settle for.
As for the miners, they had held the country to ransom three times in the early 1970s. They had pursued pay claims of 16%, 13% and 21% in successive years. Their industrial action saw most of industry restricted to a three day week and the Heath government was finally toppled by their claims. Others have already explained why Arthur Scargill so badly managed the 1984 dispute. If the electorate had known the NUM would be stripped of their power to black out the country it is highly likely that Mrs Thatcher would have been elected with an even greater majority because her policies of change were what most people wanted.
I knew family members who worked in the print in the 70s and 80s, sir.prize. Believe me they had among the most highly paid, highly sought after jobs among unskilled/semi-skilled workers in the country. They followed “Spanish Practices” that would seem incredible today and the only way in to those jobs was by positions being handed down from father to son (certainly not to daughter). They had ample opportunity to reform and chose industrial strife instead. Mrs Thatcher did not wreck their lives, they wrecked them all by themselves.
The “Print” was one of the many industries hide-bound by Trades Unions who, as has been pointed out, would accept no compromise, no modernisation, no changes and wanted huge pay rises in return for their “co-operation“. As I said in reply to another question, by the end of the 1970s most people in the UK were sick and tired of waking up every morning in the knowledge that workers in one or more of the services on which they depended for a civilised existence had embarked on “industrial action” (a misnomer if ever there was one). The question posed about whether Mrs T would have won the 1979 election if the electorate knew what was to take place is very appropriate. The answer, without any doubt in my view, is that indeed she would. Believe me, I was there. It was an absolute nightmare and most people craved for change. They wanted an end to successive Prime Ministers inviting Union barons to No.10 for beer and sandwiches to discuss what sort of double digit pay rise they would settle for.
As for the miners, they had held the country to ransom three times in the early 1970s. They had pursued pay claims of 16%, 13% and 21% in successive years. Their industrial action saw most of industry restricted to a three day week and the Heath government was finally toppled by their claims. Others have already explained why Arthur Scargill so badly managed the 1984 dispute. If the electorate had known the NUM would be stripped of their power to black out the country it is highly likely that Mrs Thatcher would have been elected with an even greater majority because her policies of change were what most people wanted.
//....all their viable mines....//
of the 24 nottinghamshire deep mines operating at the start of the strike, all but three (Harworth, Thoresby and Welbeck) had closed by 2004, by which time the UDM's membership numbered just over 1400 mine workers. The last pit in the West Midlands (Daw Mill) closed last month with the loss of 500 jobs.
of the 24 nottinghamshire deep mines operating at the start of the strike, all but three (Harworth, Thoresby and Welbeck) had closed by 2004, by which time the UDM's membership numbered just over 1400 mine workers. The last pit in the West Midlands (Daw Mill) closed last month with the loss of 500 jobs.
On print, I was working off Fleet Street and got first-hand information. The 'print' in our national newspapers was the most prized skilled job in Britain. To be recruited into it, meant being promoted by existing workers with influence. It was a father- to- son occupation. The abuses were extraordinary. Men were claiming pay for non-existent workers; a standing joke was that Mickey Mouse was employed, from an alleged name employed for this purpose; and over-employment was universal. But the employers were powerless to enforce change, because of the loss of revenue if the day's paper was lost, and the merest threat to production was enough.
Rupert Murdoch stopped all this. He planned to shift production of The Times to Wapping and have the plant equipped with modern machinery. He kept the print unions onside but secretly struck a deal with the electricians' unions. The resulting strike lasted a year, a year without production. But he had deep pockets and wasn't worried. The end result was the death of hot metal printing of national newspapers. It had already died in the provinces, where the unions were less powerful,or less like dinosaurs or Luddites. Now, what good did the unions do, untrammelled as they had been?
Rupert Murdoch stopped all this. He planned to shift production of The Times to Wapping and have the plant equipped with modern machinery. He kept the print unions onside but secretly struck a deal with the electricians' unions. The resulting strike lasted a year, a year without production. But he had deep pockets and wasn't worried. The end result was the death of hot metal printing of national newspapers. It had already died in the provinces, where the unions were less powerful,or less like dinosaurs or Luddites. Now, what good did the unions do, untrammelled as they had been?
In short, "Get real Britain - you live in an international world" - and that's what she promulgated......unions back in your pen; management - wake up and get real and updated. Her positive legacy (i) the ability for the younger or more enlightened to seize this, (ii) providing the financial ability to do this - her first Lawson budget being pure brilliance - unearned income tax down from 98% to 40% and earned - was it 60% max but down to 40%.......(iii) and, in doing so, reversing the brain drain that would have sent young and aspiring entrepreneurs, scientists, engineers, actors, artists and all the rest who believed and practised excellence overseas.
Yes she had her faults later on....and I have documented some of my concerns on other threads.
Yes she had her faults later on....and I have documented some of my concerns on other threads.
Scargill was guilty of being arrogant, and he certainly had a lot to learn about tactics. But he was the democratically-elected leader of the union.
Every night during the miners strike he was on the TV telling everybody that unless they acted, all or most of the coal pits would be closed in Britain. And he was right ! We now import coal into Britain, which is a bloody disgrace.
Nye Bevan, one of my heros once said that "Britain is an island made of coal surrounded by fish"
My god, those words sound a bit hollow now don't they ?
And ymg...Thatcher did more damage to this countries industrial ability than the Luftwaffe.
Every night during the miners strike he was on the TV telling everybody that unless they acted, all or most of the coal pits would be closed in Britain. And he was right ! We now import coal into Britain, which is a bloody disgrace.
Nye Bevan, one of my heros once said that "Britain is an island made of coal surrounded by fish"
My god, those words sound a bit hollow now don't they ?
And ymg...Thatcher did more damage to this countries industrial ability than the Luftwaffe.
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