Many pits were considered uneconomic [25] to work at then current wage rates compared to cheap North Sea oil and gas, and in comparison to subsidy levels in Europe. Noticed a typo? As far as he was concerned, there was no such thing as an unprofitable pit, and he saw McGregors proposed closures as a way for Thatcher to weaken the NUM, close down far more pits than McGregor was claiming and lead the way to privatisation. When this plant-life died, it rotted away and was buried and compacted into layers underground. 3 Following a question about the so-called Winter of Discontent, James Callaghan reportedly said "Crisis? But it was more than that: to the communities involved, from Scotland and South Wales to Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, it often felt like an undeclared civil war, pitting village against village, family against family even brother against brother. Between March 1984 and March 1985, more than half the country's 187,000 miners left work in what was the biggest industrial dispute in post-war Britain. 16,779 per year . They became travelling miners, living in villages which had a large proportion of miners but transported to the pit by bus or increasingly driving their own cars. You can change your cookie settings at any time. $180 - $5k. Learn about salaries, benefits, salary satisfaction and where you could earn the most. What separate event occurred in 1973 that prompted the 1974 Miners' Strike? Let's look at a brief history of the coal mining community throughout Modern British history. These wages were often essential for a family's survival. On the inland plateau there were mining communities around the steel town of Consett in the north-west and Durham City in the centre. Be perfectly prepared on time with an individual plan. Our website keeps three levels of cookies. mine workers were employed not by the mine owner but by a charter master Mines were the beating hearts of communities stretching from Scotland to Kent. In 1884 the average wage of the colliers in Whitfield colliery was 42,976 per year. Fig. Meanwhile the newspapers played up every skirmish for all it was worth. Not many old men are found in the mines. Use of this site constitutes acceptance of theTerms and Conditions. From a purely economic point of view, it can be argued that it was. The interviews will be archived in due course by the British Library. Edward Heath introduced the 1971 Industrial Relations Act which introduced a legal framework for how Trade Unions operated and controlled how miners' wages could change. Men and women were required to behave according to certain norms, and if children misbehaved their parents would know about it by the time they got home. This also detrimentally affected Britain - its second most used fuel was oil. The 1972 strike was a result of Edward Heath refusing to allow the 43% wage increase the NUM was demanding. By David Egan. Joseph Gormley presided over a period of relative harmony in the coal industry for the rest of the 1970s and achieved the relatively peaceful closure of 40 pits in that period. Later that day, miners at the Cortonwood Colliery in Yorkshire walked out on strike. Percentage changes in wage rates, miners, South Wales, 1848 - 1939 General Notes -----Note I. asked the Secretary of State for Employment whether he will publish in the OFFICIAL REPORT as The three most famous strikes in Modern British history are the 1972, 1974 and 1984 Miners' Strikes. By clicking on 'Agree', you accept the use of these cookies. TV EYE reports from the North East where the particularly bitter memories of the 1926 coal strike fuel the deter. In some factory towns, colliery strikes lead to evictions of families because the mine owners also owned the workers homes. Miners' strike: The decades-old feud that still divides - BBC The Northern Star and Leeds General Advertiserprinted the minutes from a delegation of Miners of Northumberland and Durham. Stop procrastinating with our study reminders. All the rates published are below 42. Miners wives, in even greater numbers, returned to education and became teachers, social workers or probation officers. Coal. The strike officially ended on 3 March 1985. Thousands of miners were arrested, fined, imprisoned or sacked, some never to work again. While ZipRecruiter is seeing annual salaries as high as $89,000 and as low as $23,000, the majority of COAL Miner salaries currently range between $39,000 (25th percentile) to $54,500 (75th percentile) with top earners (90th percentile) making $73,000 annually across the United States. This book traces these competing narratives at the level of individuals but also seeks to ascertain which narratives dominate at the regional level: stories of triumph, stories of regeneration, stories of fragmentation and failure. Like Scargill, Mrs Thatcher struck a remarkably aggressive, uncompromising tone right from the start. 1975 1980 Average weekly Average hours Average weekly Average hours wage () worked wage () worked United United United United 1968 SIC Wales Kingdom Wales Kingdom Wales Kingdom Wales Kingdom Food, drink and tobacco 53.00 60.29 43.4 46.2 103.82 115.61 44.2 45.5 Coal and petroleum products 72.46 69.74 41.2 42.6 129.34 136.07 41.4 44.2 But with both sides refusing to compromise, the strike dragged on for almost exactly a year, causing immense hardship to thousands of families, before Scargill reluctantly conceded defeat in March 1985. On the 5th January 1972, the National Executive Committee of the NUM rejected a small pay rise from the National Coal Board, who then 2 days later, withdrew all pay offers from the last 3 months. Tens of thousands of miners went on strike following an announcement by Coal Board Chairman Ian McGregor that 20 uneconomic pits would have to close, putting 20,000 miners out of work. At first, this was not a problem as local union branches had deep pockets and could pay miners at least some of money they were no longer receiving from the NCB. By the 1980s the British coal industry was one of the safest and most efficient in the world. The Miners Strike of 1984 was a turning point in British history. England 1980s UK HOMER SYKES RM TR9C1E - 3rd March 1985. In the 1970s, the NUM and NCB negotiated miners' treatment. An association of workers in a trade or profession which works to protect, and advance, their rights and interests, Moving aspects of the economy from private to government control, Selling nationalised industries to private buyers and investors, Due to a severe lack of fuel, Edward Heath announced that most commercial and industrial establishments could only use electricity, would give the Conservatives a more significant majority and give him more influence in negotiations. But in Nottinghamshire, the majority of. Strikes have been used by miners as a form of protest for centuries. In 1984 there were 174 deep coal mines in the UK by 1994 the year the industry was finally privatized there were just 15 left. There are signs, however, that this was gendered too, with daughters of miners doing better than their brothers. Bonus. The miners were on top of the world in the 1970s, able to hold the country to ransom to stop pit closures and raise wages. What was one of the defining violent events of the 1984 Miners' Strike? Thatcher had taken note of the way the miners had brought down her predecessor and was determined the same thing would not happen to her premiership. He was sentenced to three months in prison. The most recent, Who Dares Wins (Allen Lane, 2019), covers the early 1980s, including the first Thatcher administration, the Falklands War, and the New Romantics. Roughly how many strikes occurred during the Winter of Discontent? In 1971, Joe Gormley, president of the NUM, demanded a 43% wage increase for coal miners to counter the Conservative government's offer of a 7-8% increase. The miners an all-male occupation were powerfully backed by their wives, who saw clearly that without the pits there was little hope for their childrens future or the viability of the mining community. 248 reviews 16 salaries reported. Free learning resources from arts, cultural and heritage organisations. Labour formed a minority government as Heath refused to agree to a coalition and resigned. The second difference was that the government was far better prepared in 1984 than it had been 10 years earlier. Copyright 2023 - Faculty of History, George Street, Oxford, OX1 2RL In County Durham the focus is on Chester-le-Street, where the pits at Pelton Fell and South Pelaw closed in the 1960s but which acted as a turntable between the inland plateau and the coastal area. In Nottinghamshire, where most of the miners did not come out on strike, a distinction has to be drawn between the more militant pits in the north of the county, bordering Yorkshire, such as Manton and Warsop Main, and pits further south, such as Annesley, where there was much less support for the strike. Secondly, it is a local and regional approach, a close study of certain mining communities in the context of their region. But this time was different. This article, written in 1974 by Homer Butler, notates typical wages received by local coal miners and the effects of striking for higher wages on the miners and their families from just after the turn of the century to the depression. 1 The 1926 General Strike was coordinated by the Trade Union Congress to protest against miners' wages. The dependence on coal increased throughout the United Kingdom from when the first coal mine was sunk in Scotland under the Firth of Forth in 1575. 3.3. pp. Children explained how they were fitted with a girdle and chain around their body to pull the coal out of the mine. Free and expert-verified textbook solutions. This entailed privatising state-own industries, thus reducing the subsidies provided by the government. Camaraderie was a watchword: they looked out for each other in the dangerous work below; their lives depended on it. On 18th December 2015, the closure of Kellingly Colliery in North Yorkshire, England, marked the end of deep coal mining in Britain. Many of these men had little capital and often paid wages in goods not Create and find flashcards in record time. Starting in 1851, inspectors recorded fatalities, and they found that respiratory illnesses were common and that various illnesses plagued the mining population. How Thatcher broke the miners' strike but at what cost? Even further south, in Leicestershire, only thirty miners went on strike but became some of the most active missionaries of the strike nation-wide, nicknamed The Dirty Thirty. 1976: Wilson unexpectedly resigned as prime minister and was replaced by James Callaghan. Coal output also increased to meet the higher production targets set by the NCB. and demonstrated his inability to recognise the country's troubles. Scargill had risen through the ranks of the National Union of Mineworkers in the 1970s. The 6 March 1984-3 March 1985, miners' strike was a major industrial action to shut down the British coal industry in an attempt to prevent colliery closures. So, was it a good thing that the miners lost? Miners forged their sense of themselves as the shock troops of the Industrial Revolution. MacGregor turned the steel industry around, making it profitable in 3 years. While the miners of Kent, Scotland, the North East, Yorkshire and South Wales downed tools and took to the picket lines, their counterparts in the Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, South Derbyshire and North Wales coalfields carried on working. Clashes between the police and strikers resulted in injuries and deaths and demonstrated a legalising of state violence against protesters, hailing in a new era of state control. Roughly how many jobs were at risk when the National Coal Board announced its plans to reduce Britain's coal production by 4 million tonnes in March 1984? Logically, coal mining had to go. But was it a good thing for the country that the miners lost their last battle? Three months of negotiations with the National Coal Board ended in deadlock four days ago with an offer. A miner's shift: 'near the face it's hot - up to 38C' Most Nottinghamshire miners refused to strike, as did smaller groups of miners elsewhere. AETNUK. 5 The police force was integral in dealing with the 1984 Miners' Strike when conflicts arose. Twice in recent years, in 1972 and 1974, the miners had struck for higher pay, and both times they had won. Since 1979, Nigel Lawson, the Secretary of State for Energy, stockpiled up to 6 months' worth of coal in case of further strikes. Coal Miners | Trade Unions | Margaret Thatcher - YouTube Details of the national standard weekly rates of wages of various categories of coal miners, operative from 1st April 1973, are given in the publication "Time Rates of Wages and Hours of Work".