Earlier this week a BBC
Inside Out programme claimed that police officers were told what to write in their
statements, following clashes at the Orgreave coke works. Labour is now calling
for an inquiry into claims that South Yorkshire Police manipulated evidence
during the miners' strike in 1984. The shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper told
the Commons the issue needed to be investigated.
The news reminded me
of one particular day during that strike. One that has stayed with me ever
since. During the strike I was branch secretary of NALGO at Westminster City
Council. They were heady days. The now disgraced Shirley Porter was leader of
the council. Just across the water. Ken Livingstone was running the GLC.
Like many trade union
branches we twinned with an NUM branch during the strike as a focus for our
fundraising efforts to support striking miners and their families. In the
summer of 1984 we twinned with Carcroft NUM near Doncaster in what is now Ed
Miliband’s constituency.
The rest of this blog is
an article, ‘They want us there today’, written by Tim Taylor (a NALGO fellow
branch officer) and me following a visit to Yorkshire to forge relations with
our twin NUM branch. It was published in Westminster NALGO’s branch magazine,
State of the Union, in September 1984. And it describes what happened when we
found ourselves on a mass picket at Gascoigne Wood near Selby the day after the
first Yorkshire miner had returned to work.
Inside Out reminded me
of the day and the article. For anyone who was there at the time, the revelations
about allegedly falsified police accounts will come as no surprise at all. The
real story of what happened has been there all along in the accounts of those
who took part in the strike. And those like me who bore witness to it.
‘They want us there today’ by Tim Taylor and Chris Creegan, State of the Union, Westminster NALGO, September 1984
The report that follows
is an account of what happened when we were taken to a mass picket during our
visit to a mining community in South Yorkshire. We wanted to view for ourselves
the actions of miners and police on the picket lines so much talked about in
the news. Quotes are from miners we met on the day.
We were staying
with a miner’s family in the Brodsworth area just outside Doncaster. Having
reported along with local striking miners to the welfare we were driven to
Gascoigne Wood colliery near Selby where the previous day the first Yorkshire
miner to break the strike had returned to work. ‘They want us there today’,
commented our driver as we asked whether the police were likely to prevent us
from reaching the colliery. On arrival we were met by hundreds of miners keen
to indicate that support for the strike was still strong.
‘It’s as much a
display of solidarity as anything else and God, we need that now.’
We were instructed to move towards the pit gates and joined maybe 2000 other pickets in a field adjacent to the colliery road, which was occupied by a line of police several thousand strong.
‘This pit has been
democratically closed by those who work there. There’s all this talk of the
‘right to work’ but you don’t get this lot down (the police) when MacGregor
shuts a pit, to defend our right to work.’
As we stood in
anticipation, local union officials moved through the crowd urging pickets to
remain calm.
‘This isn’t exactly what
I’d call fun. We’ve been beaten and punched and kicked and it’s bloody cold.’
The situation did remain
peaceful until police ‘thoughtlessly’ rushed two vans towards the pit gates.
Pickets thinking (wrongly) that this was the man’s return to work, surged
forward in an attempt to block the road. As scuffles broke out and truncheons
were drawn, police were heard to say ‘take your pickets now’.
‘This bloke going in
today, I don’t blame him. We’ve all suffered and for some I suppose it just
gets too much. But he’s still a scab and he’s letting everyone down – himself,
his community, his kids…’
The situation soon
calmed and by about 11.00am miners began to drift off, anxious to avoid further
clashes but satisfied that their presence had been felt. ‘Coming in? With you
lot here? You must be joking’ said a superintendent as we walked away.
Pickets were soon
reflecting on the morning’s events. Many of the older pickets were critical of
others’ hot headed response to the police. They were conscious of having been
used and sure of what the press would have to say.
‘Mindless hooligans’,
‘mindless horror’, ‘mindless violence’ said the Express. They all got it wrong.
We saw the police charge first and pickets act only in defence. Maybe they had
been right – they had wanted us there that day.