Miners' Strike 1984 RSS Feed


The Northern Echo is marking the 25th anniversary of the Miners' Strike with a series of reports starting Thursday, March 5 in The Northern Echo and online. Most of Britain's 200,000 miners went on strike in the week following a walkout at Cortonwood and what followed were some of the most violent picketline scenes ever witnessed in British history.

Share your memories of the 1984 Miners' Strike

5:54pm Wednesday 4th March 2009 in


It is 25 years since the beginning of the miners' strike, one of the longest and bitterest strikes in British history.

On March 5, 1984, miners at Cortonwood, in South Yorkshire, voted to walk out over a decision to close their pit.

Within a week, most of Britain's 200,000 miners were on strike, including 23,000 in the Northumberland and Durham coalfields and Britain witnessed some of the most violent picketlines in its history.

Share your memories of the miners' strike, 1984, by adding your comments via the form below.

Comments(3)

Site Editor says...
5:56pm Wed 4 Mar 09

Scargill's 'sole purpose was to bring down the government.' I remember the chill I felt when I heard him say on Radio 4 that he was out to smash the capitalist system. This gem was broadcast a few years before the 1884 strike and he tried several times to bring the miners out. Each time, they rejected the call at the ballot, but in 1984, there was no ballot. In my view, the miners were bitterly betrayed by Scargill, who manipulated them into his class struggle, but Thatcher's destruction of the coal industry was a viscous act of revenge.
Tony Fox, Gateshead, England

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Site Editor says...
5:57pm Wed 4 Mar 09

I was a police officer throughout the Strike and I felt then, and still do feel, great sympathy for the miners. However, their one enormous handicap was Arthur Scargill. If the miners had possessed a leader capable of speaking with reason and common sense, rather than indulging in stupid ranting, they would probably have kept the hearts and minds of the British people and won!
Robin Saltonstall, Beverley, England

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Billabong says...
8:49pm Thu 5 Mar 09

'Smash the capitalist system'and replace it with what i wonder?

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