Skip to main content
Work with the NEU
‘We were staying out, ballot or no ballot’
In the first of two features, ex-miner PAUL KELLY shares his experiences as a 24-year-old striker in the miners’ strike against pit closures of 1984-5

I WAS born in Lower Broughton, Salford, in Sussex Street, next to Andrew Street, where Ewan McColl was born. My father, grandfather and uncles were all coalminers.

My uncle Harold worked at Bradford colliery and was a friend of the playwright Jimmy Allen. Mining and politics were my life from an early age.

I began work at Agecroft colliery in the late 1970s. My dad also worked at the pit. I took part in the strikes of 1969, 1972 and 1974 picketing with my dad — all great victories for the miners and the working class.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
battle of orgreave
Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign / 10 July 2026
10 July 2026

The public inquiry is the result of more than a decade of determined campaigning. Now, those who fought for justice want the full story of government involvement and police conduct to be told, says KATE FLANNERY

Protesters outside the main gate of Rupert Murdoch's News International plant at Wapping, East London, January 25, 1986
Workers' Rights / 24 January 2026
24 January 2026

JOHN LANG recalls how Murdoch used scabbing electricians and even devised a fake newspaper to force a confrontation with printers – then sacked them all

News International Print plant at Wapping, East London, January 23, 1986
Workers' Rights / 24 January 2026
24 January 2026

Forty years on, TONY DUBBINS revisits the Wapping dispute to argue that Murdoch’s real aim was union-busting – enabled by Thatcherite laws, police violence, compliant unions and a complicit media