Mick McGahey

[dennisr]

Yeah that's the way to progress - we never learn from our mistakes because we never make any!

Members of my own organisation - Miners - were shafted by the NUM leadership both during and after the strike. They were pointing out the limitations of the NUM leaderships tactics then rather than a decade+ later for what are spurious reasons. They would still not compare Scargill's mistakes to the people who really sold out the miners, their families and their communities.

You should worlk out who the really dangerous enemies are

 

[rioted]

- you who uncritically supports the real authoritarians of the present government apparently.

So how long did you spend on picket lines trying to stop non-ballotted workers from going in? I did a lot of it, it shouldn't have been necessary.

 

[rioted]

Why not point out the 'tendancies' of the labour and trade union leaders who really shafted the miners?

Because I thought this was a thread about McGahey and, by extension, the rest of the NUM leadership?

 

[dennisr]

So how long did you spend on picket lines trying to stop non-ballotted workers from going in? I did a lot of it, it shouldn't have been necessary.

1 year

not in notts though

so we lost - so you are bitter and cannot see the wood for the trees. I agree the tactic was wrong. The OPs reasoning is a very different one though (and hint: its got nowt to do with 'democracy' - thats just a useful smokescreen)

 

[dennisr]

Because I thought this was a thread about McGahey and, by extension, the rest of the NUM leadership?

So you think that was all there was to the OPs comments - life that that black and white is it??

 

[dennisr]

Yeah that's the way to progress - we never learn from our mistakes because we never make any!

come on 'rioted' (sic) do enlighten all of us as to the lessons you learnt?

 

[butchersapron]

Maybe he could fill us in on the NACODs ballot?

 

[dennisr]

Another example of this.
Agecroft miners in the North West were ready to come out, until a mob of Yorkshire miners turned up and smashed up their bathouse.
Because of this, the majority of them stayed in work.

Wouldn't mind hearing/seeing proof about this 'example' of Yorkshire violence.

I would have thought it would have been repeated ad infinitum given who won and who lost yet cannot find a word of it online?

Given I was based in the North West for at least four and a half months (Bold NUM) during the dispute - and yet still no memory of it

 

[sonny61]

Wouldn't mind hearing/seeing proof about this 'example' of Yorkshire violence.

I would have thought it would have been repeated ad infinitum given who won and who lost yet cannot find a word of it online?

Given I was based in the North West for at least four and a half months (Bold NUM) during the dispute - and yet still no memory of it

Info came from an electrician who worked at the mine.
Also it was reported in the Manchester Evening News and was on the local news, not sure if it made national media.
It happened at the beginning of the strike

 

[dennisr]

Info came from an electrician who worked at the mine.
Also it was reported in the Manchester Evening News and was on the local news, not sure if it made national media.
It happened at the beginning of the strike

Given the North West never needed to be picketed out, as far as I remember - they came out from the beginning although they had to picket their own pits for a few weeks (one of my mates - a young miner being one of those who as unsure at the beginning - Yorkshire had a token presence on local pickets) the North West was solid, and was the mainstay of the flying pickets in north wales (the power plants) etc - despite the conservatism of the local union tops and alongside the simple point - repeated for you here - that this would have been repeated ad infinitum (as the Notts ballot was - and still is by you a decade+ later) rather than left to a local news story - I think that electrician was pulling your plonker sonny - in the same way you have been trying to pull ours.

Think about it - genuine 'proof' of genuine 'violence' (apparently...) by Yorks miners coming from other miners themselves?? - and you are saying it would not have been taken up by every rag in the UK??

So - do tell us more about Mick McGs principles? and do you feel you have similar principles?

 

[sonny61]

The majority of miners stayed at work at Agecroft. There was a short time when the majority was out, but that did not last.

 

[audiotech]

While we're on the subject of miners.

 

[dennisr]

The majority of miners stayed at work at Agecroft. There was a short time when the majority was out, but that did not last.

Possibly, we'll have to take your word on that - which is a bit of a problem given your posts so far. The vast, vast majority of miners across the country were on strike - you may have noticed, the government certainly did

 

[barney_pig]

http://archive.thisislancashire.co.uk/2004/3/22/501033.html
seems to lay the lie to sonnys claims

 

[ViolentPanda]

Come on please. The tactic of setting miner against miner makes him a good general?
Sending miners from Yorkshire down to Notts, to force them out was a disaster.

Except that's not quite how it happened, is it, Sonny?

Understand human nature, if people are threaten with violence to do something they are not sure off.
It does not follow they will do as they are told. The opposite in fact, it made the Nott miners stay in work, as they did not like giving into threats of violence from outsiders.
Thats how people are.

Except, again, that's not quite how it happened.

Another example of this.
Agecroft miners in the North West were ready to come out, until a mob of Yorkshire miners turned up and smashed up their bathouse.
Because of this, the majority of them stayed in work.

If Scargill would have held the ballot asked for my many miners, he would have won!

Miner against miner was something the Tories were delighted about.

Miner against miner is something that Ridley and Joseph had arguably been planning since the Heath govt. The state was operating on the premise of forcing a wedge, and they went to those they knew would buckle first, Notts.

 

[ViolentPanda]

So good, he wanted to be president for life. Very democratic. Oh and that McGahey bastard did everything he could to destroy solidarity from fellow workers, to destroy direct links between local pits and the wider community: It's either the leadership way or no way! Trench warfare is all he could understand.

And yet the majority of the membership supported them. Why was that, do you think?

 

[Belushi]

Good man McGahey, only a shame the Unions didnt have more like him.

 

[ViolentPanda]

So Scargill has authoritarian tendancies - there's a surprise.

On this thread the weaknesses of the likes of Scargill are being exploited by a complete hypocrite - you who uncritically supports the real authoritarians of the present government apparently.

The fact is Scargill had not choice but to support the mood of his members - what alternative was there? - it was not only 'his' way or tens of thousands would not have walked out and stayed out as long as they did.

Why not point out the 'tendancies' of the labour and trade union leaders who really shafted the miners?

Because that would mean having to face reality.

 

[Belushi]

Miner against miner is something that Ridley and Joseph had arguably been planning since the Heath govt. The state was operating on the premise of forcing a wedge, and they went to those they knew would buckle first, Notts.

They had a long history of scabbing, they had their 'Spencer Union' in the 20's.

The government knew exactly what they were doing.

 

[JHE]

Not just press speculation - good authority within the NUM at the time. 'Settled' wasn't quite right term - they would never have gone for the battle in the first place.

Have you got a CP source saying that?

As for 'they were not going to win' - that debatable - a) they could have b) some would argue they almost did and c) did they have a choice other than to fight?

Taking those in reverse order...

c) No good option. The options were accept pit closures or resist.

b) People who claim that are kidding themselves. Do you remember all the putting-a-brave-face-on-it stuff after the defeat, with Benn and Co claiming that the miners had not been defeated? Nobody believed that - and it had been pretty clear for months before that the miners were not going to win. (That's one reason, BTW, why sympathy for the miners went up in the last portion of the strike. Some people who had not agreed with the strike and disliked Scargill, nevertheless hated the spectacle of the govt grinding the miners down. It seemed cruel.)

a) Well, yes, but not alone. The strike could only have been won, IMO, if some key group or groups of other workers (eg, transport workers) had struck in solidarity with the NUM. There was lots of sympathy from people in strike support groups and from members of the public giving to collections for the strikers, but without solidarity strikes, the strike was not going to be won. Coal stocks + a determined govt = too much for the NUM alone (esp. with a portion of the miners rejecting the strike).

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Good man McGahey, only a shame the Unions didnt have more like him.

Quite.

Louis MacNeice

 

[sonny61]

Scargill, left it to each region to decide if they wanted to strike, because he feared he would lose a national ballot.
If I remember correctly, the Notts miners voted 7,000 for the strike, 20,000 against.

By adopting this tactic he split the miners, just what the Tories wanted.
If he he had held a national ballot, many, myself included think he would have won by a small majority.

Even if had lost, the mood of many anti strike miners would have changed when they saw the real extent of pits being closed.
Then a strike with the support of all miners could have happened.

Think of what could have been, if it was not for Scargill.
The whole political landscape of Britain could be much different now.

It was the biggest opportunity the left had in this country, and the chance was blown.

 

[PaulOK]

McGahey was CP. The CP were awful politically during the strike, but there's no reason to believe they were working for the state.

Yes, The CP were awful politically, however, they would have been less susceptible to infiltration than the myriad of Trot groups.

KGB yes but not MI5/Special Branch.

 

[Louis MacNeice]

Think of what could have been, if it was not for Scargill.
The whole political landscape of Britain could be much different now.

It was the biggest opportunity the left had in this country, and the chance was blown.

Accusing Scargill of being responsible for the particular defeat of the miners and the more general defeat of the left, has to be the very definition of perverse. On the one hand Thatcher, Ridley, MacGregor et al. and on the other Kinnock, Willis and the rest, would be much more suitable targets for your condemnation.

Cheers - Louis MacNeice

p.s. which is not the same as seeing Scargill as some sort of working class saint beyond criticism.

 

[Fisher_Gate]

Yes, The CP were awful politically, however, they would have been less susceptible to infiltration than the myriad of Trot groups.

KGB yes but not MI5/Special Branch.

Yes I think that's true. To infiltrate some left groups is easy - buy paper one week, invited to public event, member and sitting in local meetings next week. Such groups however rarely pose a threat as their membership tends to be a revolving door.

I'm thinking of the SWP in particular; Militant always used to be much harder to join as they had a two tier structure - Militant supporters and the RSL.

I'm sure all left groups have been infiltrated at some time.

Alan Thornett tells the story in his biography of how when he was a senior union member in the Cowley factories, I think he was in the WRP at the time, he was being given a lift by a car to a meeting by a fellow member when a police radio suddenly came on. He says they always had their suspicions , and just assumed that everything they discussed at internal meetings got back to the state anyway. Certainly when the IMG members were sacked at Cowley in the 1980s, it was clear there was a direct line from the organisation to the state to the factory management.

In the period after the second world war, so great was paranoia about the Soviet Union, that the state used to routinely find out the names and addresses of voters for CPGB election candidates, something that is illegal but relatively easy to do (and still can be done btw because we still do not secret ballots in this country).

 

[nightbreed]

I'm thinking of the SWP in particular; Militant always used to be much harder to join as they had a two tier structure - Militant supporters and the RSL.

News to me about the two tier structure in Militant. Who told you that? MI5? Or did you read it in Michael Crick's book about them?

 

[Fisher_Gate]

News to me about the two tier structure in Militant. Who told you that? MI5? Or did you read it in Michael Crick's book about them?

No I don't take much notice of Crick's account. Experience - I was in the LPYS for many years when they dominated it. Also a member of the RSL Central Committee joined the IMG when I was in it and did an educational on how they organised. The IMG and RSL briefly fused in the 1960s and the RSL remained the British section of the Fourth International until the late 1960s.

They had three circles among youth in the late 1970s/early 1980s - the LPYS, which tended to be a formal/front version of the tendency as most people who weren't in it dropped out quickly; the Militant readers group, which was where they got together to discuss broad political questions; and the RSL which was strictly "invitation only" and not publicly talked about. They ran with this structure throughout the 1970s but by the early 1980s I think the RSL became less important and 'Militant'/'Militant Tendency' became de facto the organisation. People like Joe Marino of the Bakers Union who was on the TUC General Council during the miners strike and played an honourable role in mobilising in support of the miners, were associated with the Militant structure but probably weren't in the RSL which was kept pretty small (500 or so) for a long time.

 

[ViolentPanda]

They had a long history of scabbing, they had their 'Spencer Union' in the 20's.

The government knew exactly what they were doing.

Precisely. The knew the weak link and they went for it with a chainsaw.

 

[trevhagl]

as were the trade union leadrs and those of the labour 'leadership'.

New Labour has been using the same approach for a long time now - divide and rule.

Thats just what i was thinking. But not just New Labour, people on here who bitch about other left wing groups and forget the real enemy

 

[trevhagl]

I got a book about Fathers 4 Justice at the library and if anyone thinks we live in a democracy you wanna see how THEY have been followed around, stigmatised, exposed by the establishment- i mean it's not something i support 100percent (some fathers are cunts and don't deserve to see their kids - the violent wifebeater types i mean) but it's a proper eye opener to see how a humourous stunt-led movement was monitored by the powers that be, and makes ya wonder how much they spy on serious political movements...