“SOME things just stick in your mind,” as Vashti Bunyan sang all those years ago.
As I packed my bags yesterday for Durham, where I’ll be spending the weekend at the Big Meeting, I couldn’t help but think of a speech I heard there four years ago, when I was attending the Miners’ Gala for the first time.
Tosh McDonald, then president of train drivers’ union Aslef, spoke of the historic connection between the railways and the coal industry.
Durham Miners’ Association chair STEPHEN GUY speaks to Ben Chacko about the Reform threat, what’s needed from Labour and why the Big Meeting will never lose its politics
The Durham Miners’ Gala is a celebration of working-class culture, but also a call to action — to rebuild workers’ collective strength, says KIM JOHNSON MP
Two-hundred years ago, on September 27 1825, the world’s first passenger railway line was opened between Stockton and Darlington. MICK WHELAN, general secretary of Aslef, the train drivers’ union, reflects on the history – and the future – of Britain’s railway industry


