Hundreds of people packed into the NUM's Barnsley headquarters on Saturday for a celebration of women who supported the miners' 1984 struggle against pit closures.

The event was organised by Women Against Pit Closures (WAPC), which was founded to support the strikers as they took on Thatcher and eventually mobilised thousands of women from pit communities.

Speaking at the event, Durham Miners' Association secretary Davy Hopper brought the audience to its feet as he attacked Labour and those union leaders who failed to join the fight not only against pit closures but also the Tories' continuing attack on the trades union movement.

He tore into the "legacy of Thatcher and Blair," and called for the Labour Party to be taken back to its roots and aims - working class people and their welfare.

Hilary Wainwright of left magazine Red Pepper paid tribute to WAPC and to organisers Anne Scargill and Betty Cook, recalling how Ms Scargill had called on the feminist movement to mobilise, resulting in the raising of more than £500,000 for the struggle by Christmas 1984.

Actor and Morning Star supporter Maxine Peake spoke of the inspirational actions of WAPC and the community-based women's support groups.

She recently wrote and performed in a BBC Radio 4 play based on the courage of four WAPC women who went underground to occupy Parkside colliery in Lancashire during the Tories' final onslaught on the publicly owned coal-mining industry in 1993.

"During the strike Thatcher underestimated the women," she said. "She thought the women would send the men back to work. They did not."

She said activists of WAPC had been role models for women in Britain and around the world.

"But what Thatcher did has not gone away," she said. "We need more role models."

At the close of the event WAPC veterans burst movingly into voice with the song We are women, we are strong which was written for the group.