As Margaret Thatcher took office as Britain’s first female Prime Minister in May 1979, she faced a nation mired in economic recession.
Businesses went bankrupt and inflation and unemployment rose. Thatcher immediately set out to reverse the economic situation, based on his firm belief in the independence of the individual from the state and limited government interference in the economy. Her goal when she took office, she later said, was to move Britain from a “dependent society to a self-governing society, from a nation that gives itself to me into a nation. handyman ”.
To do this, Thatcher focused on privatizing public industries – like steel and coal – which depended heavily on government subsidies, as well as limiting the power of British unions. In the 1970s, strikes by the National Union of Miners (NUM) caused widespread fuel shortages and brought the country to a screeching halt. Thatcher had seen how the effects of the strikes toppled the government of the last Conservative prime minister, Edward Heath, and was determined to avoid the same fate.
On the other side of the looming coal battle was Arthur Scargill, who became chairman of the National Miners ‘Union (NUM) in 1981. As Yorkshire miners’ chief during the 1974 national strike, he helped to launch more radical tactics for workers’ organizations (such as sending picketers to specific factories to stop the transport of coal) which made this strike such a success.
The strike begins
Miners and young Socialists from the Labor Party demonstrate during British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s visit to London Docklands on April 13, 1984. Striker signs read “Save the Pits!” and “Maggie Thatcher Job Snatcher”.
Les Lee / Daily Express / Hulton Archive / Getty Images)
On March 6, 1984, the National Coal Board announced its plan to reduce the country’s coal production by 4 million tonnes, in an effort to stem an annual loss of $ 340 million. At the time, Britain had 170 working coal mines, commonly known as pits, which employed more than 190,000 people. Scargill and the NUM estimated that the council’s plan would result in the closure of 20 pits and the loss of around 20,000 jobs.
On the same day the plan was announced, miners at a South Yorkshire mine left work. Scargill took the opportunity to call for a nationwide strike against planned well closures. Controversially, he never held a national vote in the NUM, and not all miners agreed with the walkout. In parts of the country, miners continued to work, sparking tensions with picket workers who called them “strike breakers”.
Using Scargill’s aggressive picketing tactics, the striking miners managed to close numerous pits across Britain. But unlike the 1970s, Thatcher had taken steps to stockpile enough coal and coke to keep the country supplied for at least six months in the event of a strike. She had also made secret deals with non-union drivers to transport the coal, ensuring that blackouts did not cripple the country like in previous strikes.
Violence between minors and the police
Police loading pickets outside Orgreave coking plant, June 18, 1984. Striking miners were greeted by huge lines of police who were brought in from across the country.
John VarCharlie Ley / Mirrorpix / Getty Images
The striking miners clashed with police forces backed by the Thatcher government, in clashes that often turned violent. The stakes were high on both sides: Scargill compared the strike to Britain’s fight against Nazi Germany, while Thatcher saw it as an opportunity to permanently crush the militant unions. Documents declassified in 2014 revealed Thatcher was planning to call on the military to transport food and charcoal, and even declare a state of emergency in order to strengthen his government’s position.
Some of the worst violence has occurred in South Yorkshire, including a standoff at the British Steel coking plant in Orgreave on June 18, 1984 involving 10,000 miners and 5,000 police officers. When the smoke cleared, 51 miners and 72 police officers were injured in what became the “Battle of Orgreave”. Dozens of minors have been arrested, but government legal action against them failed after it emerged that police fabricated evidence, among other wrongdoing.
The legacy of the strike
Margaret Thatcher, speaking to reporters about her immense relief at the news of the end of the miners’ strike on March 3, 1985. Mining leader Arthur Scargill said the campaign against job losses would continue but that minors would return to work. The final vote of the national executive of the National Union of Miners was 98 to 91 for a return to work.
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As the strike dragged on, Thatcher’s government stood firm. Miners who worked in Nottinghamshire and southern Leicestershire founded a rival union, the Miners’ Democratic Union, and many miners across the country gradually began to return to work.
On March 3, 1985, Scargill and the NUM voted to end the strike after 362 days. Marching bands, parades and colorful flags accompanied many miners to work, as they put a brave face on defeat. There were no regulations, and Thatcher’s government had not made a single concession. The Prime Minister’s firm stance helped build his enduring reputation as the “Iron Lady” – a nickname given to her by the Soviet press in the 1970s. She would lead the Conservative Party to three consecutive elections and would hold office for 11 years , longer than any other 20th century British politician.
The failure of the 1984-85 miners’ strike helped revive the British economy, but had major implications for the future of unions and coalmines in Britain. Union membership fell from around 40 percent of the country’s workforce to just 20 percent, and fell even lower in the decades to come.
In 1994, when the coal industry was finally privatized, Britain only had 15 coal mines; when Thatcher died in 2013, there were only three left. The miners’ strike and the devastating impact of the disappearance of coal would leave lasting scars on many former British mining communities, as well as a lingering resentment against the government and the police force that would continue into the next century. .
