Unions warned yesterday that wrecking Britain’s mining industry left the country dangerously reliant on imports.

National Association of Colliery Overmen, Deputies and Shotfirers delegate Terry Fox said that mines were now “hanging by their fingertips,” with two deep coal mines due to close in 2015, leaving just a single deep mine in Britain.

“In this historic 30th anniversary of the miners’ strike, think how many great leaders of this industry have stood on this platform warning of this,” he told the hall.

“They say we want taxpayers’ money for our mines. No — we want some of the £5 billion you’ve had out of miners’ pension funds since privatisation to invest in our industry.”

The National Union of Mineworkers’s Nicky Wilson said that declining stocks of US coal would lead to rising prices and called for action to save the mines.

And Community’s Sue Mather said carbon capture and storage should be at the heart of a British “green reindustrialisation strategy.”