Tory spin on coal masks fact that 80 per cent of coal jobs were lost under Thatcher

Amid the concerted attempts to reinvent the Thatcher years in recent days, an intriguing, counter-intuitive claim has been doing the rounds that rather than being the enemy of coal mining Margaret Thatcher was actually kinder to the industry than previous governments.

Amid the concerted attempts to reinvent the Thatcher years in recent days, an intriguing, counter-intuitive claim has been doing the rounds that rather than being the enemy of coal mining Margaret Thatcher was actually kinder to the industry than previous governments.

The inference seems to be that the lingering animosity towards Mrs Thatcher, particularly in many former mining communities which have celebrated her demise in passing days, is somehow unfair.

Alastair Heath in the Daily Mail (where else?) argued that:

“The slow demise of coal mining has been a tragedy for many communities, and the cause of much suffering. But more mines were closed during Harold Wilson’s two terms in office than in Thatcher’s three – and yet he remains a left-wing hero.”

The point was echoed over at ConservativeHome:

“Then there is the charge that it was Margaret Thatcher who ‘destroyed’ the coal mines and the mining communities. How many times have the BBC broadcast that claim without refutation? Yet the facts show that far more coal mines closed under the Labour prime ministers Harold Wilson and James Callaghan.”

Unsurprisingly, both are being highly selective with the facts. The historical data shows that while 212,000 coal mining jobs were lost under the 1964-1970 Labour Government, under Mrs. Thatcher’s 1979-1990 government, the percentage decline in jobs was actually double that.

43 per cent of mining jobs went in the 1960s under Wilson while 80 per cent were lost under Thatcher. Also, as the trend rate of economic growth was lower under Thatcher than Wilson (just 2.8 per cent compared to 3.4 per cent) and unemployment was considerably higher throughout the 1980s than the 1960s, redundant miners had fewer alternative job options as a result of Mrs Thatcher’s stewardship of the industry.

As former NUM official Ken Capstick put it in The Guardian this week:

“Miners had always known that eventually any of the colleries would close and were always prepared to accept that as a fact of life and find employment somewhere else within the industry, but Thatcher’s attack was wholesale. It was seen for what it was, nothing to do with economics, but purely an attempt to destroy the National Union of Mineworkers by wiping out the entire industry.’

“Thatcher was hardly a benign force when it came to coal mining, despite what some of her admirers would now have us believe. She accelerated the trend decline in coal for ideological reasons, using the 1984-85 miners’ strike to break the industry while waging a wider battle against organised labour. Indeed, she records her attitude to the miners in her memoir, ‘The Downing Street Years’:

“…it was only by ensuring that they lost face and were seen to be defeated and rejected by their own people that we could tame the militants.’ (P.343)”

So striking miners were infamously described by her as ‘the enemy within’, with the security service MI5 was set loose on them. More recently, allegations that officers conspired to lie in witness statements during the ‘Battle of Ogreave’ – (when 10,000 strikers clashed with 5,000 police at Orgreave Colliery in South Yorkshire in June 1984) – have gained fresh urgency following the revelation that the police used the same modus operandi straight after the Hillsborough tragedy.

But many in mining communities also recall the special callousness directed towards them by Thatcher. Striking miners’ wives were denied hardship payments (which they had always previously been able to claim during a strike), with some reduced to selling wedding rings to feed their families as they struggled during the latter stages of the year-long stoppage.

So this attempt to rehabilitate Mrs Thatcher’s legacy is a revision of history too far. I’m afraid many mining communities continue to despise Mrs Thatcher for entirely sound, evidence-based reasons.

56 Responses to “Tory spin on coal masks fact that 80 per cent of coal jobs were lost under Thatcher”

  1. Lord Palmerston

    I keep hearing this nonsense about “the jobs market was better in the 60s”. So why did the Wilson government keep pits open in Wales, Scotland and Lancashire when they were losing money hand over fist? The 1968 Fuel Policy White Paper envisaged that by 1980, there would be just 30,000 miners left. Typically in 1968, the Left was more worried about Vietnam and bourgeois student politics than protecting miners, and very little was heard about it at the time.

  2. unionworkeruk

    The “left” could not act without a lead from the miners themselves. At the time the NUM went along with redundancies and closures. Only when Scargill and other militants started fighting back in the early 70’s did those of us outside the pits have the opportunity to support. Who do your think organised the support at Saltley Gate if the not the “left” ?

  3. Nick Reid

    You make a reasonable point about there being a healthier job market in the 1960s for unemployed mine workers to seek other jobs but your comparison of 80% v 43% job losses is just statistical sophistry.

    What you are really saying is that if someone takes an industry of 400,000 workers and sacks 200,000, then they are no “worse” than someone who takes an industry of 200,000 and sacks 100,000. Because both cut the same 50%.

    I suspect the “extra” 100,000 who lost their jobs in the first example might have something to say about that.

    You claim that Alister Heath et al are “selective” with their facts. But no of mines closed and no of jobs lost are pretty basic and substantial facts. What is selective about that ?

    You also seem confused about the definition of “trend rate of growth”. But let’s leave that for another day.

  4. Ron

    If you’re going to battle misrepresentations of statistics, it’s better not to do the same yourself. I If 43% of jobs are cut, 57% remain. 80% of 57 is 45.6. So as a percentage of the total jobs lost from the starting total, you’re actually comparing 43% and 45.6% – not much difference. I hate Thatcher as much as anyone, and the actions of her and her government towards the miners were brutal, mean and shortsighted, but you’ve got to do better than this to counter them.

  5. Paul Hilton

    How many mines were opened or re-opened during the Labour years of 1997-2010? That’s right. Zero, rien, zip, nada, sod all. Doesn’t that mean labour was just as harmful to mining areas as their opponents?

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