Farmers aren’t miners

A parallel is being drawn between the Tories and the miners in the 1980s and Labour and the farmers today. On the left, there is an implied element of revenge: you screwed our people, so we’ll screw yours. It is true that the miners’ marches in London 40 years ago had much the same earthy atmosphere of ‘real people’ confronting authority as did the farmers’ rally this week. But in the end the comparison does not work. For the Conservatives, the miners themselves were not the enemy. The problem was the vast cost of uneconomic pits to the taxpayer and the declared determination of the NUM leader, Arthur Scargill, to bring down the government. Mrs Thatcher regarded the working miners, who refused to strike because Scargill would not allow them a strike ballot, as heroes. She even had secret contacts with them and entered into friendly correspondence with some of their wives who were being intimidated by the strikers.