A Coalminers Tale – from 1984

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The Miners Strike in the UK occurred in 1984/85, and this year is its 40^th Anniversary, more or less.

In 1984 I had just started a new job as an insurance claims adjuster. It was a decision which was to take my career in a particular direction for the next four decades but that’s not the point of this short anecdote.

The Strike had occurred because of the intention of the Thatcher Government not only to shift the energy balance away from coal which was deemed both dirty and uneconomic (but more the latter), but more importantly in an effort to break the trade unions, in this case the National Union of Mineworkers led by Arthur Scargill. He’s an interesting character in his own right but that, as they say, is a quite different story.

Scargill called the mineworkers out on strike which was observed across the country, including in Kent where I was living at the time. Police were mobilised, and things turned out very nasty. The workers depended on payment from the Unions to make ends meet but as the strike went on then the money started to run out. Some say that Thatcher simply starved them into submission.

I remember as a young boy, when my own father came out on strike. I guess it must have been in the early 60’s, and we were living in a small terraced house in Lancashire. There was no money coming into the house and things were tight. Strikers make sacrifices.

As for this tale, it relates to a claim for theft submitted by one of the coal miners who was working in the Kent Coalfields. I think it might have been for the theft of a bicycle, or something like that. I remember visiting, and for some reason it seems that there was no claim to answer. Maybe a breach of a policy condition, I can’t remember. Anyway, I told the guy that the claim wasn’t covered, and that insurers couldn’t help. He had wanted a cash settlement.

I remember him saying ‘But my family are hungry’. Probably they were. I suppose I could have authorised the payment and no-one would ever have known, but insurance money isn’t my own personal money. I didn’t have the right to give someone else’s money away. I held my ground, and no payment was authorised.

40 years is a long time to remember a particular claim, amongst hundreds and maybe thousands that I had dealt with in my career. I’ve learned a lot about people and situations in that time, and also a bit about myself. But I think I would make the same decision today as I did 40 years ago. At least I’m consistent.

On the other hand, on a less consistent note, I think my attitude towards unions may also have changed. I’ve never been ‘part of the union’ at any time in my working life, but I think the increasing influence of AI and how this will affect working conditions cries out for greater and more effective workers representation.

AI is a force for change but to every force there’s an equal and opposite reaction. In 1984, the reaction was violent and uncompromising. Hopefully the reaction to the introduction of new technologies will be less aggressive than 40 years ago, and that the outcome isn’t one that leaves innocent people truly hungry.