MINERS have welcomed Labour’s plans to set up specialist clinics to ease the plight of retired pit workers suffering from lung disease.

The policy was announced in Treeton, South Yorkshire, today by shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth, who met former miners to discuss plans to open health facilities in mining communities.

When employed, miners were provided with health services such as regular lung checks by the National Coal Board, but with the closure of the mines this provision vanished.

Former miner Brian Wright told the Morning  Star: “I went in the pits straight from school, but I see a lot of my ex-colleagues who were older than me and you can tell that being a miner takes its toll.

“We were a bit ignorant towards what we did at the time. If you can picture a thick fog, our conditions were like that, but that fog was all dust.

“In the pit, you were provided with air defenders and rubber dust masks, but it wasn’t mandatory. Nobody from health and safety told you otherwise, and you only wore one if you had one. If you didn’t, you just had to suffer.

“My friends who trained me in the pit – I talk to some now and they’re rasping and gasping for breath.

“Normal hospitals can’t deal with things like this. It’s not their fault – they don’t have the resources.

“If you get these facilities, where you get regular checks and information to go forward and prevent you getting any worse, you can live more comfortably.

“We ex-miners still deserve to be treated well. It would be a massive bonus. There might not be many miners still working, but there’s plenty of former miners left.”

Labour North East Derbyshire parliamentary candidate Chris Peace, the daughter of a miner, told the Star: “Our area has an honourable mining heritage and I’m proud that the next Labour government will be taking action to support our former mineworkers across our area.

“Our miners deserve to be provided with the health support they so desperately need. And on top of this, the long-standing injustice of the Mineworkers Pension Scheme needs to also be addressed – and will be under a Labour government.”