‘We were never Margaret Thatcher’s boot boys’ (From The Northern Echo)

‘We were never Margaret Thatcher’s boot boys’

10:45am Wednesday 11th March 2009 in

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In what they describe as the worst 12 months of their careers, two former high-ranking Durham officers tell Marjorie McIntyre about the dark days of the miners’ strike and the ensuing bitterness between pit communities and the police.

AS police fought to contain pickets during one particularly heated exchange outside Murton Colliery, County Durham, during the Miners’ Strike, Superintendent Eddy Marchant received a request from one of his officers to pull a constable out of the already over-stretched frontline.

The reason – during the ebb and flow of the picket line, the officer had come face-to-face with his striking brother. It was a dramatic moment which illustrates the way the strike divided communities and opened a bitter chasm between the police and pit families.

Previously law-abiding folk up and down the Durham coalfield suddenly found themselves in a headon collision with bobbies they had once viewed as their friends and protectors.

For many, it would take decades to heal the rift.

There were 490 strikerelated arrests in County Durham and, as tempers flared over the bussing in of the handful who wanted to return to work, residents in colliery villages watched as hundreds of police marched into their communities, creating siege-like conditions which some will never forget.

While officers were drafted in from across the UK, village bobbies found themselves donning riot gear as they struggled to keep the peace with angry pickets.

Supt Marchant, who became deputy chief constable of Durham Police, was one of the high ranking officers seconded to colliery command posts. “It was a very difficult time and the police were literally the piggies in the middle as we ensured law and order was maintained,” said Mr Marchant.

Speaking from his Durham home, the now retired officer who completed 44 years of service, was keen to point out: “The average miner was well behaved, there was only a small hardcore who caused trouble.”

At times, the police were outnumbered by hundreds of pickets and the officers in charge had their work cut out ensuring the safety of those in their ranks.

“It was a very sad time and I wouldn’t want to live through it again. There was no glory and we took no pleasure in it,” he said.

While accepting the dispute created a rift between the police and the mining communities, he pointed out: “There were only 25 complaints made over police action at the end of the strike, the majority of which were against officers from outside forces.”

Another of the then superintendents charged with manning the makeshift colliery command posts was Brian Mackenzie, now Lord Mackenzie of Framwellgate.

Speaking from the House of Lords, he said: “I am a Durham boy myself and had many friends who worked at the pits. None of us relished the situation we were placed in, but we had a job to do and that was to ensure that the law was enforced.

“We were never, as was frequently claimed at the time, Margaret Thatcher’s boot boys, we were simply enforcing the law. None of us were politically motivated.”

During the dispute, 6,700 officers were brought in from across the country but, contrary to widespread rumour at the time, Lord Mackenzie insists no soldiers were ever brought in.

There were moments though, he says when it was like operating in “war-time”

conditions, but claims that generally the policing was good hearted, particularly on the part of local officers.

He said: “The scale of the dispute, however, left us with no alternative but to draft in more officers, some from the Metropolitan Police and others from Wales. They were only here for a short time and they were less sensitive, but we were stretched and needed some relief.”

As trouble flared, officers in protective helmets operated in shielded ranks against hundreds of angry miners in what he describes as riot situations.

But despite the inevitable headlines and graphic photographs illustrating the bitter conflict, Lord Mackenzie agrees with Mr Marchant: “Really there wasn’t a lot of violence, but when tempers flared, we had to make the decision to issue protective clothing to officers who were in danger of being injured.

“As well as keeping the peace, we had to ensure that those who wanted to get back to work were allowed to and I believe we did our job with reasonable responsibility.”

Policing the strike cost Durham, Cleveland, Northumbria and North Yorkshire forces an estimated £21m, but the true cost was more important.

Lord Mackenzie accepts that, as a result of the force’s part in the dispute, the police lost empathy.

“There is no doubt that it damaged the relationship between the police and the public,” he said.

“Before the dispute these had been close-knit, lawabiding communities and in one fell swoop the goodwill which had been long established between the police and residents was destroyed.

“It was the saddest 12 months of my 35 years in the force. It was a very divisive time for everyone, particularly for families with sons both down the pit and in the force, those families were literally torn apart.”

With the passing of quarter of a century, though, he said: “I’m confident the police have re-established their good relations. Though, I accept, there will be some who will never view the police in the same way again.”

■ TOMORROW: Davey Hopper, secretary of the North-East National Union of Mineworkers, remembers a fight to the death.