Wales must turn the tide
Socialist Organiser1983 1983-01-06Read it in the scan (PDF), scan page 15 →
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THE South Wales miners' area executive will be meeting the area Coal Board management on Monday 10th to press its demands for more investment, and on Wednesday 12th there will be a special area conference to decide plans for the strike called from January 17.
17 out of 33 pits in South Walés are classified by the Coal Board as 'short-life' and investment there is tiny compared with other areas: Thus the South Wales NUM strike decision, taken before Christmas, was a move to come out fighting against closures.
It had the possibility of starting a movement that would, in the words of NUM president Arthur Scargill, "spread like wildfire through the coalfields."
Miners at Kinneil quickly followed the lead. They struck and 12 of them started a sit-in. But then things started going wrong.
Mandate The Scottish miners' area leadership did not put into action its standing mandate to call a strike over Kinneil. It called a special area conference on December 28 - and reromCALL. mended a return to work at Kinneil.
The line of the leadership, and of area President Mick McGahey, was that support was insufficient. The Financial' " Times report, presumably reflecting McGahey's. private explanations, said that the area executive had made 'behind the scenes' efforts to drum up support" but had insufficient response.
Whatever the behind the scenes efforts, they could not have the same value as a bold public campaign by the area leadership. No-one, can guarantee that such a campaign would have been successful. But we can guarantee that the abject climbdown over Kinneil has had a destructive effect on the possibilities of an escalating national struggle against closures: And closures are the last issue on which an approach nf ducking today's fight in favour of hopes about tomorrow's is appropriate.
But there is still plenty of will for a fight in the coalfields. •'They had better not sell us out in Ayrshire" , shouted one angry delegate leaving the Scottish confernece. The South Wales miners can turn the tide.