1980s miners strikes?

[CaulkheadUpNorf]

I'm watching Pride, which is set 1984-5, which is before I was born, and it's made me realise I know nothing about the miners strikes.

If you remember it, were affected by it, what was it like? Or are there some things I can read to find out more? There's very little online

My dad was a miner and my mum a UNISON shop steward. As the strike wasn't legal - according to my dad who worked for another mining Union - he was still paid, even though he refused to cross the picket lines. He still can't stand Scargill to this day. My mum on the other hand thought he was going to Save the working class. It was an awful time to be in their house. Things worsened when my uncle who lived in Nottingham joined the DUM and went back to work. I can see how rift happen, ill feelings fester and families get torn apart.
And yes, the police were allowed to act with impunity, this was never shown on the news at all. Officers from the MET were drafted in, real hard case bully boys come to show the 'Norf ow its done.' Real twats.

Yes, communities were never the same afterwards, but it was the way Mrs Thatcher ground 'us' into the ground again and again. Folk cheered when she died and they meant it.

There are a whole generation of adults that never knew what it was to have their dad find a decent, honorable job, just a succession of Gov schemes. The work ethic was ripped away with their dad's pride.

this is facinating, thank you. Were most working people in a union in the 80s or was it that most miners were, if that makes sense?

I'm in Birmingham, but grew up on the Isle of Wight.

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I remember seeing the caged buses and my dad also died of lung disease caused by working in the pits for many years. That's the other great scandal about all this - conditions were appalling. An older relative lost a leg working in the pits and several times my dad came home with injuries and a few times came home early because someone had been killed at work.

And yes, the police were allowed to act with impunity, this was never shown on the news at all.

There was plenty of footage of Miners having the shite knocked out of them by police, I remember it clearly

I remember it but wasn't directly affected by it. I was 13 at the time and still believed that the miners would "win" and keep their jobs.

I had some understanding of what being on strike meant as my dad's car factory used to strike a lot in the 70s so I knew the effect it had, and how it meant that you got less for tea, had your cousin's old clothes, your birthday presents used to belong to someone else and your mum and dad argued and cried a lot. The full implications of it largely bypassed me but I had a lot of sympathy.

It was the Miners Strike and also Greenham Common that politicised me and opened my eyes to the corruption and lies that central government so frequently spouted.

All I will say is there is more than one side to every story

I'm from a mining village in the north east, was born before the 80's strikes but not quite old enough to remember the them.

My Dad wasn't a miner but his dad was all of my mums family were. I was talking to my Aunty and Uncle about the strikes recently. My uncle travelled to pickets all over the north east and Yorkshire. My Aunty worked and managed to keep them going with help from my mum and dad.

Stealing coal from the pit heaps in wheelbarrows and pushchairs was a common occurrence.

As a child after the strikes it was common to go the the pit doctor, he dressed my knee after I fell off my bike

My village was hit hard by the closure of the pit too, drug use was rife and unemployment was sky high. I'd say a good 50/60% of my school year turned to drugs. I was genuinely out of the ordinary for going to college and learning to drive etc.

I've found some great websites with pictures before. Will hunt them out and post links

'White collar' workers often weren't in unions iirc, same as now really. Whereas people who did more physical jobs (presumably those that required greater protections) often were I think

My FIL was a striking miner.

DH said they all had to be given free school meals but had their own special queue being miners children. He also says poaching was rife including FIL at the big estates nearby and that he ate rabbit and even venison.

MIL had to get a job to pay the bills and the shop she worked in allowed her to bring BIL in his pram along and sleep outside the shop.
She says it was like Victorian times where the bath water was used by everyone and she shared laundry water and powder with the neighbours to wash clothes.

FIL is still on strike now He had only ever been a miner and never worked again.

All I will say is there is more than one side to every story

Yes - this ⬆️⬆️

Gosh, Odins, how old was your FIL at the time?

Also mining communities in south-east England that were affected too, remember cars covered with paint stripper and scab painted on houses.

I remember it but only as an adult do I understand the impact it had on us. My dad had to go into short time at work, parents were broke, had to borrow off my grandparents to pay their mortgage etc. I was too young to notice that as they made sure we kids got fed and clothed!

I remember the scabs and the picket lines, the police and Arthur Scargill but only from the telly, lived in Worcestershire so no mines there!

My uncle used to take me out at weekends to "walk the dog" in the local woods. He would then always "find" stuff hidden in tree trunks (and steal birds eggs) and we would go to the pub afterwards, then the next week my gran would have a bit of money. I wasn't allowed to tell my dad about the walks, apparently because he wouldn't approve of me walking the dog.

Only as an adult do I now realise he was on the rob and I wasn't allowed to tell my dad because he would have stopped me going and I was essential for a cover story, who would think he would drag a little girl into a criminal enterprise. The strikes were desperate times.

I'm not from the area originally, but I live in a former mining village in County Durham, which has never recovered. A guy I know at the gym told me a couple of years back that his dad and uncle, both miners, still don't speak to each other over it. His uncle lives in a different part of the country now, but comes to the Durham Miners Gala every year and they all ignore each other, if their paths ever cross during it.

I don't know if my recollections are right, but everyone was in a Union.
All the major industries were done away with, one at a time by Ian MacGregor. The ship yards, British steel and the pits. I remember power cuts in the early 70's as the miners were asking for a living wage and were striking to get it. I know we were poor, 1 tin of soup between us 3 kids for our tea, if we were lucky a slice of bread. Then one time the bakers went on strike too! Mum had to make our own, on our open fire range - yes, this was the 1970's I'm talking about. Looking back, she didn't even have a slice of bread for her tea. But everyone was in the same boat and I can still remember playing shops with the contents of our tin cupboard, on shop day there would be around 12 mixed cans - beans, spaghetti and soup oh and an extra tin of peas for a Tuesday if the pies were cheap on family allowance day, we'd get pie, peas AND chips then. It really was awful, we never had enough of anything ever. Certainly never had a dessert after tea, ever.
So striking for a decent wage wasn't a big ask, I can see that it would cost the Gov millions and why Mrs Thatcher thought she had to break the Unions - plebs who are keeping the country going need to be kept in their place.

I remember it. I was 18 . I watched communities being destroyed and nothing being done to help.
I remember it being reported that the Queen was upset after Orgreave and what her police officers were being expected to do on Thatcher's bidding. Stuff about the Queen's views is NEVER made public. Even if that was only half true it showed how bad it had got.
As horrible as the Tories are at the moment, it was nothing like that. Whole communities just written off.
My brother left mining as it started to unfold. Heartbroken.

Millions Not every job had a union. I worked in the 80s but there was no union for my job

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/politics/2015/dec/20/coal-kellingley-miners-easington

That's a good article about the strike, and life after the pits too. This is a village just along the road from me. The Guardian have some good photographs dotted across their articles too

Thanks Heidi for the link and for everyone who has contributed. It has helped put the film into context.

Livia great, but as I've said, its just my recollection. My mum was a shop steward, everyone we knew was in a Union. If your family - men folk - didn't work in the pit, they worked in the shipyards. My mum had a job as a Provident collector then she was taken on at the Mental Hospital as a domestic and had to join the union. When she was on the Provie, there was no union.

mynotsoperfectlife FIL is in his 70's so he would have been in his late 30's early 40's. He also went on strike in the early 70's too. Obviously that ended a bit differently to the 80's strikes.

My uncle worked for the coal board legal team. There were plenty of viable mines. It was a Thatcher policy to quash the unions, nothing more, nothing less.

Dh is from a mining village in the north east, and we lived there for several years in the 90s
We had a council house and it did not have any shelves in any of the cupboards. They had all been burnt on the fire in the strike. Dh said people used to burn all sorts to heat the house, even shoes, which he said stank
The norm was for men to work down the pit and the wives to look after children and home, not many women worked
If the man was for on strike, then there would be no money coming in, DH says all the children got free school meals even in the school holidays
DH's dad had to go back to work, he had 4 children and it did cause divisions in that some people stopped talking to him
Fortunately, DH didn't go down the pit, he joined the RAF instead
But there are men that never worked again after the pit closed and an awful lot of resentment towards the Tories was created as whole towns were decimated by the closure of the mines
In fact DH hated Thatcher so much we drank champagne when she died, having had the bottle in the fridge for a few years