This is the last article you can read this month
You can read more article this month
You can read more articles this month
Sorry your limit is up for this month
Reset on:
Please help support the Morning Star by subscribing here
A PACKED Durham Cathedral heard praise heaped on key workers at the traditional banner-blessing ceremony staged as part of the Durham Miners’ Gala on Saturday.
The moving ceremony welcomes banners rediscovered or recreated representing the miners’ union pit branches.
The ceremony, attended by about 1,000 people, was addressed by Paddy Lillis, general secretary of union Usdaw, many of whose members in retail and distribution were among those who played a vital part during the pandemic.
Mr Lillis said that during the “dark times ... a beacon of hope shone through, the workers who kept the country going.
“In our hospitals and in our care homes, they held our NHS together. They held the hands of the dying and, somehow, they held themselves together, day after day, night after night, in the toughest conditions you can imagine.”
Millions more emptied bins, stacked supermarket shelves, delivered mail, kept transport and energy functioning, and supported vulnerable people, Mr Lillis said.
