WITH the Conservative government set to extend further pay restraint into a second decade, and with trade union activity at a historically low ebb, a new generation of trade union leaders are grappling with how to work with their members, and with politicians, to lever government policy. 

There are some positive signs. Trade union membership has ticked up for a fourth year running. 

New leaders such as Unite’s Sharon Graham have extensive experience in organising and leverage which has resulted in increased workplace actions. 

And for many young people without experience of trade union membership or taking industrial action, initiatives such as Strike Map UK are making what industrial action there is more visible and accessible.

But political education and labour movement history is vital to building power.  

The 50th anniversary of the 1972 miners’ strike is an opportunity to look back on a pivotal moment for working-class confidence, and workers’ industrial organisation, and to consider what lessons there are for the labour movement today.

Today the mining industry has disappeared and the make-up of the British economy and workforce has changed significantly, but the conduct of the strikers and their supporters, the demonstration of solidarity and of the confidence in the working class to confront the government over their falling living standards, is something we should seek to learn from today. 

Public-sector pay restraint was felt across wider sectors, the postal workers had failed in an industrial dispute the year before, but such was the working-class culture of trade union solidarity that the miners received support from engineers, railway and power station workers, from trades council and student union activists.

Labour MPs too, from socialists to social democrats, offered them support in Parliament.

In the years before the strike, the mining industry saw a reduction in pits from 550 to around 300, and a workforce that fell from 400,000 to 250,000.

“Stoppages” in the coal industry had fallen from 1,666 in 1960, to 221 in 1968 and during that time, miners’ pay fell below the national average.

The strike, which lasted six weeks, demonstrated an escalation of militancy in the miners’ trade union, and resulted in the government’s declaration of a state of emergency, the introduction of a “three-day week” due to power shortages, and the threat of significant unemployment in other sectors, but ultimately secured a pay increase of around 27 per cent. 

The political culture in which the strike took place was markedly different to today.

There was widespread support for the action among the general public.

The Labour front bench was committed to resolving the dispute in the interests of the miners.

And the deployment of a range of campaigning tactics, from flying pickets, to shut downs of workplaces outside of the coalmining sector, such as power stations, the solidarity actions of other trade unions, all while continuing negotiations with the employer, are worth understanding.

In the first parliamentary debate on the strike, Labour’s spokesperson, Harold Lever, said: “This coal strike must be seen as part of general policy which cannot be acceptable to us.

“It is a policy of selective pressure on the public sector,” and on the miners in particular, he said: “Their status has gone. Their average wages have declined in relation to other people’s.

“Over the last four years, even on averages, there has been a loss of real wages to the miners. Over a few months, if the offer had been accepted, their wages might have kept up with the recent changes in prices, but over four years the miners have not only watched a relative decline in their status but an actual decline in their real standards of life.”

Wrapping up, he declared: “It is my privilege on behalf of my party to pledge that we will not stand idly by and that we stand solidly behind the miners in their sense of grievance and intend, as we believe the whole of the trade union movement intends, to support them in their efforts to secure justice.

“In doing so we will be giving expression to the deepest wishes of the great majority of forward-looking people in this country irrespective of party.”

Three days into the action, the Guardian reported plans for a “24-hour continuous picket of power stations, docks and coal stocks.” 

The same story reported “the first signs that other unions are beginning to help the miners appeared yesterday,” when dockers and railway workers pledged to prevent the transport of other coal supplies, while “other unions to pledge support are the woodworkers, the public employees, the shop workers, the Civil Service union.”

A month later, Labour moved a motion to condemn the government’s role in the strike and the imposition of “their own rigid wage ceiling.” 

On February 9, the government sought to increase pressure on the miners by announcing a state of emergency.

The Conservative prime minister Ted Heath announced: “A great part of British industry will be on half time. Millions of men and women will be put out of work as their factories close down. Some jobs will be permanently at risk.” 

Employers in the steel and car-making factories began announcing significant lay-offs as a result of the reduction of electricity use.

In the debate on the emergency powers, Shirley Williams spoke for Labour in saying: “It is clear that Britain faces the most serious industrial crisis since the war … We believe that the government’s obstinacy, incompetence and incredible complacency have done a great deal to create that emergency.

“It is an emergency which should never have happened. It is an emergency of the government’s own making. That is why we shall vote against the emergency regulations tonight.”

The state of emergency, the three-day week power measures, and threats made regarding mass unemployment demonstrated the Conservative commitment to maintaining pay restraint and the threats to livelihoods they were prepared to make in facing down working-class campaigners for better living standards. 

The miners deployed a range of tactics. Alongside picketing their collieries to prevent use of non-unionised labour, they picketed other workplaces involved in power supply to pressure the government.

By February 12, the media reported that eight power stations were shut down and 69 had cut back output. 

Another tactic was flying pickets. On February 10, the front page of the Guardian reported that “half the factories in Birmingham are expected to be hit today by a one-day strike of engineers in support of the miners’ attempt to force the closure of a depot containing the last major reserves of coke in the region.” 

Though it didn’t refer to it by name, this referred to the Saltley coke depot, the closure of which was seen to turn the screw on the government.

Later, the miners descended on Parliament, with Labour’s chief whip facilitating a mass lobby on February 15.

Ultimately, with the government having tied the hands of the Coal Board, but unable to rapidly defeat the miners, a rapid three-day inquiry by Lord Wilberforce resolved the dispute.

Providing a platform for NUM secretary Lawrence Daly to characterise the government approach as a “general lockout of the working people of this country,” and that “their pay policies are the basic cause of unemployment today.” 

Alongside NUM members giving evidence, they were supported by new MP Michael Meacher.

Wilberforce recommended more generous terms than the NCB had been able to, to end the dispute. 

Little more than a week after Saltley, the NUM executive had endorsed a new pay deal and was balloting members on acceptance.

The Guardian wrote: “Mr Heath’s government has suffered the worst defeat at the hands of a trade union of any administration in modern times.”

The government’s disorganisation and lack of preparedness contrasted with the strength of support for the miners.

The Conservatives clearly learned lessons (less than a week after the conclusion of the strike, Tory MPs were discussing legislation on picketing) in the strategy to use for the miners’ strike a decade later. 

Yet for all the economic, industrial and social changes since 1972, there is merit in understanding the confidence of the working class in their own strength to seek better incomes and better living standards. 

As we face another cost-of-living crisis in 2022, from privatised energy bills, fares and regressive taxes all increasing and real cuts to pay and social security, we need to organise again.

Jon Trickett is Labour MP for Hemsworth.