Skip to main content
Gifts from The Morning Star
An unpaid debt of honour: the miners’ strike 40 years on
The workers of the coalfields are the giants whose shoulders we stand on today, says GRAHAME MORRIS MP
BRUTAL: Policemen lead away a picket from outside the NUM HQ in Sheffield, 1984

FORTY years ago the government went to war against working people. 

Their “crime” was exercising the democratic, civil and industrial rights for which working people had fought and died. It wasn’t about improving wages and conditions; it was a struggle for survival, jobs, and a way of life unique to our mining communities.

The pit was the cornerstone of mining community, providing both employment and wages. Its economic impact extended beyond the mine itself, fostering a thriving local economy with independent businesses lining the high street. Miners’ contributions would also finance essential community assets such as parks, sports facilities and welfare halls.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
miners
Books / 2 May 2025
2 May 2025

STEVEN ANDREW is moved beyond words by a historical account of mining in Britain made from the words of the miners themselves

SOLIDARITY: Miners’ wives and their supporters arrive in L
Features / 22 March 2025
22 March 2025
In the second extract from her new memoir, former NUM headquarters staffer HILARY CAVE recounts the bitter struggle to provide sustenance for strikers’ families, and the invidious role of David Willetts – now in the House of Lords
Ken Capstick, former vice-chairman of the NUM’s Yorkshire
Features / 20 January 2025
20 January 2025
Remembering KEN CAPSTICK, vice-president of the National Union of Mineworkers Yorkshire Area
Odyssey '84 at the Sherman Theatre.
Theatre review / 21 October 2024
21 October 2024
DAVID NICHOLSON is disappointed that an ambitious telling of the strike from a Welsh perspective disregards the collective struggle