Talk:National Union of Mineworkers (Great Britain)

[Untitled]
Big additions, but the article could stand to be greatly expanded. Will return to flesh out details, but wouldn't mind some help, especially on the 1970s. Mattley 22:09, 8 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The part of the article relating to the '84-'85 Strike is clearly biased against the Miners. Scargill may have been "hardline" but not as hardline as Maggie. She set out to deliberately to destroy an industry with the full apparatus of state power. The terrible truth is she won but in the process started what was called at the time a second civil war in the UK.

Holden 27

Hardly. The mines concerned were losing money. Whether Thatcher should have subsidised the mines is a valid question, but you would have to provide some evidence if you want to say she deliberately destroyed the industry. The remains of the industry closed down in the early 90s, after Thatcher had been removed. "second civil war" - nonsense. Who called it that?

The bit in the article about ballots is inaccurate. The NUM DID use the secret ballot for strike action long before it became mandatory. I will remove it unless someone can defend it.

Exile 14:39, 27 March 2006 (UTC)


 * The British mining industry was the most productive in the world. It was only troubled because Germany subsidised theirs by four times as much and France by three times as much.  To be fair to Thatcher, she wasn't the only one.  A huge number of pits closed in the '60s.  Scotland was the main coalfield after the war, but there were only 8 Scottish pits left by 1984.

The Socialist Party of England and Wales have released publications referring to the 84/85 strike as 'a civil war without guns'. I do think the section is biased against the NUM, for a start, it claims that certain pits were unprofitable without even providing a citation! Common knowledge? I don't think so, in fact I would argue with some certainty that UK coal mining was the most cost-effective in Europe, my granddad would still argue this with ABSOLUTE certainty. The point regarding the secret ballot is accurate, as Andrew Marr uses footage from the ballot of 1972 in his series on the history of postwar Britain, and that footage clearly shows the use of a secret ballot system. Anyone who has seen that footage and still claims that the NUM did not use the secret ballot is probably thick enough to believe that mines were unprofitable, or that there was a lack of general support (inside or outside the union) for the 84/85 strike. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.86.3.221 (talk) 02:48, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

National Union of Mineworkers (South Africa)
The National Union of Mineworkers (South Africa) is a large (albeit much younger) union as well. If there is no objection I'd like to move this page to National Union of Mineworkers (United Kingdom) in a couple days to make room for a disambig page. --Bookandcoffee 18:00, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
 * Got all excited - but it isn't really doing any harm the way it is. I'll leave the disambig and name change till more work is done on the South African article.--Bookandcoffee 00:23, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I was about to propose a similar change myself. The way it is may not be doing any serious harm but it does suggest a degree of anglocentrism, which we want to avoid on Wikipedia. Except I suggest "National Union of Mineworkers (Great Britain)", I am not aware that it ever organised in Ireland. PatGallacher (talk) 21:25, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
 * No, never in Ireland or Ulster -- the NUM organised exclusively coal mines and Irish mines are ferro/non-ferrous metal mines. Bigdaddy1981 (talk) 20:26, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

TGGWS (moved from user talk page)
Hi Kim, I don't see the problem adding the name of the documentary that Lawson appeared on when he was suggesting that Global Warming was being hyped (used as an excuse if you will) to close down pits and promote cleaner nuclear energy. I would have to watch it again though. You're right about the middle east, he did say that, I remember that and didn't edit it myself.

Kim, the conservative party during the 80's and mid 90's was hardly reknowned for their man mad global warming fears. I honestly believe they did see it as a way to close down pits and promote cleaner fuels.....and break up the NUM to boot... --Dean1970 19:34, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Dean that may be your view - but you are putting words into Lord Lawson's mouth - his exact quote is:
 * She was very concerned always, I remember, (when I was Secretary of State for Energy), to promote Nuclear Power. Long before the issue of Climate Change came up, because she was concerned about Energy Security, and she didn't trust the Middle East, and she didn't trust the National Union of Mineworkers. So she didn't trust oil. And she didn't trust coal. So therefore she felt we really had to push ahead with Nuclear Power. And then, when the Climate Change, Global Warming, thing came up, she felt - well this is great - this is another argument - because it doesn't have any Carbon Dioxide Emissions - this is another argument why you should go for Nuclear. And that is what she was really largely saying. It's been misrepresented since then.
 * The old version quotes him for: "the theory of anthropogenic global warming was exaggerated to promote cleaner nuclear power over coal, thus covertly weakening the NUM's influence in government energy policy." - this is not something that i can find any basis for in the text.


 * Personally i don't think this documentary is notable enough to be mentioned on the NUM page - but since its there - it actually has to be correct. --Kim D. Petersen 20:04, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Lack of a NPOV to this article
There is little or no context to the events of 1984/5 except from the miners POV. Also there is little or no history of the NUM or other events since 1945, such as the 1974 strike which crippled the UK and reduced much of the economic / manufacturing output to a that of a Three-Day Week, much of this history would actually put the political policy and the NUM '84/5 reaction to it into context. Sorry but this whole article needs to be re edited, with a NPOV rather than a POV slant. (SouthernElectric 16:54, 22 September 2007 (UTC)) template added to head of article.(SouthernElectric 14:45, 15 October 2007 (UTC))

Could we have some figures on the membership, over time?
I am hoping that someone can fill in the membership numbers for the union over time? Especially for the period around 1984/85.... say membership c. 1970, 1980 and 1990, 2000?

(As a proxy for one aspect of the economic effect of the Thatcher government's actions.)

Is it sad so many lost their jobs? Of course. But they were pretty awful jobs, in many cases. Progress? Government dictat? Who knows? But I think I know the government motives were less than altruistic. Politics at WP?! (But only on the Talk page!)

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