TRADE UNION banners will be marched through the streets of Wakefield in Yorkshire on Saturday as trade unionists, former miners and families gather for the annual With Banners Held High festival.

The festival was launched as a one-off event in 2015 to mark the 30th anniversary of the end of the 1984-5 miners’ strike against pit closures.

The festival was founded by journalist, lecturer and author Granville Williams and a group of activists. The event in Wakefield’s Unity Hall raised thousands of pounds for the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign and Justice for Mineworkers.

It has now become an annual street festival which starts with a march and has outdoor stalls, a stage, speeches, music and workshops and is a fixture in the annual calendar of labour and trade union events in northern England.

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) supports the event. NUM general secretary Chris Kitchen said: “With Banners Held High is important because it is a way of remembering our history and heritage, and it reinforces the importance of trade unions and people working together and supporting each other.

“This is a poignant year for us as it marks the 40th anniversary of the start of the miners’ strike against pit closures and given that we have still got unresolved issues going back to the strike — Orgreave and the Mineworkers Pension Scheme have still to be resolved.”

When the coal mining industry was privatised by the Tory government in 1994, pension scheme trustees struck an agreement that in return for the government underwriting any losses the scheme’s investments suffered in the years ahead, the Treasury would be given half of any surpluses accrued.

The scheme has suffered no losses since 1994 and the Treasury has creamed £5 billion off in surpluses at no cost to itself. “The government has not paid a penny into the scheme,” said Kitchen.

There are 200,000 retired miners in Britain, many suffering respiratory and other illnesses associated with their years working underground. Some are paid pensions of as little as £15 a week.

The National Union of Mineworkers has called repeatedly for the agreement to be renegotiated but has been rebuffed by successive governments.

“That money should be going to the mineworkers who paid for their pensions — not the Treasury,” Kitchen said.

The Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign — which received its largest-ever donation of £8,000 from the first With Banners Held High festival in 2015 — is campaigning for a public inquiry into the events of June 18 when police cavalry and riot police mounted a pre-planned attack on striking mineworkers picketing Orgreave cokeworks outside Rotherham in South Yorkshire.

Mr Kitchen said: “Orgreave and the policing of the miners’ strike in general — how could it be allowed to happen, that the government could take on a section of the British working class for a purely vindictive political objective?”

Saturday’s festival starts at 10.45am when marchers will assemble in Smyth Street to march through Wakefield city centre to the festival in Wood Street.

Granville Williams said: “What started as a tribute to the 1984-85 miners’ strike has now grown into a large, free, outdoor community festival celebrating the special place trade unions have in our heritage. Long may it continue!”