LABOUR MP Ian Lavery is asking Parliament to follow the example of the Scottish government by ordering an investigation into police conduct during the miners’ strike of 1984-5.

Mr Lavery, MP for Wansbeck in north-east England, is a former president of the National Union of Mineworkers.

During the strike, police invaded mining communities and conducted beatings of striking workers.

Mr Lavery’s Early Day Motion (EDM) asks MPs to welcome proposals made by the independent review in Scotland, which include introducing legislation to pardon workers convicted as a result of the strike, and calls on the British government to set up a similar inquiry.

This would be done “with a view to issuing pardons to all of those convicted,” the EDM says.

The most blatant example of police violence was the attack on peaceful pickets at the Orgreave coking plant outside Rotherham in south Yorkshire on June 18 1984, marked annually with a march and rally.

Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign secretary Kate Flannery said: “Many MPs have already supported this EDM so please ask your MP to support the EDM 904.”