THE facts of what happened at Orgreave on June 18 1984 are well known.

Armoured police launched a pre-planned attack on lightly clad striking coalminers at the Orgreave coking plant in South Yorkshire.
The police violence was probably the most brutal in the history of industrial struggle in Britain.

Ninety-five miners were arrested and dozens were subsequently dragged before the courts to face charges based on falsified police evidence. The trials collapsed.

Not a single police officer has been prosecuted or even disciplined for the offences of extreme violence they committed in the attack or the brazen perjury they committed in the courts.

For 40 years the truth behind the attack, which was commissioned at the highest levels of the Thatcher government, and the conspiracy to falsely convict striking miners, has been covered up by successive Tory, coalition and Labour governments, unwilling to expose the corruption involving the highest levels of the Establishment.

In 2012, inspired by the success of the Hillsborough campaigners in unearthing the truth behind the Sheffield football stadium tragedy, a small group of activists launched the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign (OTJC).

Fourteen years later, and 40 years after Orgreave, the campaign has grown and is supported by national trade unions and other organisations.

On Saturday next week thousands are expected to march through the streets of Sheffield at OTJC’s annual march and rally to mark the attack’s anniversary.

Speakers at the rally, who include the president of the National Union of Mineworkers during the strike Arthur Scargill, will reiterate the campaigners’ demands.

They want “to put an end to years of lies and cover-ups.” They want the truth about the political role of the Conservative government in “orchestrating paramilitary-style police operations in the miners’ strike and influencing the media and the judiciary to construct false narratives to vilify the trade unions and criminalise strikers for defending their jobs and communities.”

They want the truth about the government “directing” the pit closures which followed the strike, destroying mining communities and wrecking the lives of tens of thousands of miners and their families.

Kevin Horne is an OTJC activist and ex-miner arrested at Orgreave.

“Many of us were set upon by police in full riot gear. We were peacefully gathered and wearing T-shirts, jeans and trainers,” he said.

“Ninety-five of us miners were arrested just for being there and charged with either riot or unlawful assembly.

“Some of us could have received life sentences. Almost a year later we were all acquitted due to the fabricated evidence and police lies. Neither the government nor the police have ever been held to account for what they did to us.”

He has seen the disappointment as the campaign’s repeated attempts to win an inquiry have been denied by the government.

“The Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign submitted irrefutable evidence to the Tory Home Secretary in 2015 about why there should be an inquiry into the government planned police attacks on picketing miners at Orgreave on June 18 1984,” he said.

John Dunn, OTJC activist and Derbyshire ex-miner assaulted by police and arrested during the strike, said: “We were striking for the right to work. There is continuing anger among ex-miners that many government papers from the time of the strike are still kept secret and many stopped from public release until at least 2066.

“The growing number of people who support our campaign for truth and justice shows it must be in the public interest to hold an Orgreave inquiry.

“We need an official investigation into what the Tory government planned and what the police were told to do and allowed to get away with.

“It’s 40 years ago and many miners have died and many more are elderly and frail. How many more years are we going to have to wait for the truth to come out?”

OTJC secretary Kate Flannery said: “It seems our detailed evidence was ignored by the home secretary who in 2016 used a number of spurious reasons to emphatically rule out any kind of inquiry.

“Successive Tory home secretaries have also continued to refuse to be held to account for government involvement in an industrial dispute and the lies they told to parliament and the public.

“This continuing threat to our already declining democracy must be of serious concern particularly as a raft of recent draconian legislation has been designed to stifle dissent and prevent our right to strike and protest.”

The 2024 Orgreave Truth and Justice rally will take place on Saturday June 15. Assemble at 1pm outside City Hall, Barkers Pool, Sheffield. The rally will take place at the same venue.

Speakers: National Union of Mineworkers president (1982-2002) Arthur Scargill; Maria Vasquez-Aguilar of Chile Solidarity Network/Chile 50 Years UK; Aslef general secretary Mick Whelan; lawyer for Orgreave miners Gareth Peirce; Tribune magazine co-editor Taj Ali; Rose Hunter of North Staffs Miners Wives Action Group; John Dunn, arrested striking miner, OTJC; OTJC secretary Kate Flannery; comperes: Chris Peace and Joe Rollin; music: Unite Brass Band, PCS Samba Band.