Skip to main content
The miners’ dispute wasn’t industrial – it was political
When the miners marched back to work 30 years ago today after their epic strike against pit closures, Chris Kitchen was an 18-year-old miner at Wheldale colliery in Yorkshire. Now general secretary of the NUM, he recalls his experiences for the Star

I started in the pits in 1982, fresh from school in the only job I had ever wanted to do. I was proudly following in my father’s footsteps, as he had done with his.

I remember the personnel manager saying: “You have a job for life here lad, look after it, keep your head down, watch what you are doing and do what you are told and there will be a job for your son in years to come.”

Between ’82 and ’84 I followed what at the time seemed his good advice and although there was a sense that things were changing it never crossed my mind that the pit would close. There had always been a pit and for generations my family had always worked in it.

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
News International Print plant at Wapping, East London, January 23, 1986
Workers' Rights / 24 January 2026
24 January 2026

Forty years on, TONY DUBBINS revisits the Wapping dispute to argue that Murdoch’s real aim was union-busting – enabled by Thatcherite laws, police violence, compliant unions and a complicit media

[Pic: Andrew Wiard]
Workers' Rights / 24 January 2026
24 January 2026

A handful of journalists at The Times faced a stark personal and political choice in 1986 – cross the picket lines for cash and career, or stand with organised labour at great personal risk. BARRIE CLEMENT recalls why refusing to scab at Wapping was not just an act of union loyalty, but a stand for the future of journalism

brokens
Exhibition Review / 11 July 2025
11 July 2025

MIKE QUILLE applauds an excellent example of cultural democracy: making artworks which are a relevant, integral part of working-class lives

 TJC march on June 14, 2025 / Pic: Neil Terry Photography
Durham Miners’ Gala 2025 / 12 July 2025
12 July 2025

The Home Secretary’s recent letter suggests the Labour government may finally deliver on its nine-year manifesto commitment, writes KATE FLANNERY, but we must move quickly: as recently as 2024 Northumbria police destroyed miners’ strike documents