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Showing posts with label Caoimhin O’Muraile. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Caoimhin O’Muraile. Show all posts
Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ I can remember as plain as yesterday back in the sixties when I was too young to attend games at Old Trafford if Man Utd were on television midweek in the League Cup or any FA Cup replay my mam would wake me from bed to watch the game.

I would go to bed early and be woken for the match, often against City. Bell, Lee and Summerbee played back then for City while we had the ‘Holy Trinity’ of Best, Charlton and Law. Great days. As I reached my teens, about thirteen, we would travel by train to Manchester. Running up the hill on a wet Saturday morning, nicking fags and jibbing the bus was all part of the day out. The girls who worked in the newsagents would often chuck us five Park Drive just to rob the shop owner who paid shit wages. But these days were for the seventies as can be seen below.

The nineteen sixties, on a positive note, also saw many overdue changes on the pitch regards the player terms and conditions. The PFA (Professional Footballers Association) was headed in those days by a certain Jimmy Hill. Many may remember Jimmy as the presenter of the BBC Match of the Day. He campaigned and succeeded in getting rid of the £20 maximum wage and, in 1961, made Johnny Haynes of Fulham the first £100 per week player, Haynes is still considered by Fulham fans their best all-time player. This was achieved without the parasite so-called Agents who live off todays very well-paid players, certainly at the top level, and todays stars have the PFA, not the agents, to thank for paving the way for their high salaries.

Are players paid too much? No, not in my view, they are workers selling their labour power for a short working life and will sell that labour, like any other worker, for the best monetary wage. Agents, on the other hand, taking huge percentages of any transfer fee ‘their player’ receives are a different matter. To me they are an unnecessary burden, similar to the pimp taking a high percentage of a woman’s earnings, except the agents are legal! Alex Ferguson did his best to bypass agents but, alas, these creeps have become too powerful. I it is another symptom of money, greed and corruption in modern football.

Another progressive introduction of the sixties was the substitute. In 1965 Keith Peacock of Charlton Athletic became the first substitute to come on to replace an injured player. Charlton’s Goalkeeper, Mick Rose, got injured after eleven minutes at an away game at Bolton Wanderers and even though Keith was an outfield player he could cover in goal. This rule later changed, partly to stop Leeds manager, Don Revie, cheating by making one of his players fane injury so he could change the game if it was not going Leeds way, and bring on his substitute. The change in the rules allowed a substitution whether a player was injured or not.

In 1987 the rule changed again and two substitutes were allowed, which then went to three and now in the so-called Premier League, it is up to five subs. Once again, they have gone overboard with the substitutions, almost allowing two different teams on each side. Two subs were sufficient, to be named before the game, not two from three or five, two and one could be a keeper if the manager wished. That was sensible and keeping with the spirit of the game. In the 1968 European Cup Final Manchester United Manager, Matt Busby, named Jimmy Rimmer as United’s substitute was a goalkeeper in case Alex Stepney got injured. United crushed Benfica that night 4-1 becoming the “first English team to win the European Cup” and a song was made up accordingly.

A typical day at Old Trafford, in the mid-seventies, eighties and into the nineties or anywhere else for that matter, would begin about 7am, sometimes much earlier or even the night before if we were playing away at say Southampton, as my mam bawled me out of my cot; “are you going to see Man Utd today”? Silly question, “its seven o’clock get your arse out of your pit.” Time to shine the DMs (Doc Martens) up using Oxblood boot polish, often listening to Tina Charles singing ‘Dance Little Lady Dance’ or Abba treating us to ‘Mama Mia’ on the Tranny (transiter Radio). Polish the boots then off to the game, after a quick remark to the lasses working in the newsagent where we would buy ten number six cigarettes. The girls working in the shop would often toss us a packet behind the shop owner's back. Raid the buffet on the train, the good old British Rail Buffet for Youngers, Tartan Bitter, for the short journey to Victoria Station. Then to the pub and off to the match, buying a Hotdog from “our kid's” (all hotdog sellers were called “our kid in those days) stall.

Midweek games we would often jump on a supporters club coach which dropped us off in the old then still in partial use Trafford Park industrial Estate and the Trafford Park Hotel pub. The shunters were still running back in the seventies moving goods from the sheds, those still in use, so there was a constant hazard of these trains. Back in its time the Trafford Park Industrial Estate was the largest in Europe but by the seventies it was a shadow of its former self.

It is hard to imagine in today’s boring environment at what passes for the modern game, but on the Stretford End when packed, which was usual, urinating was often done on the terraces and it was not unknown to strike lucky with a quick shag with an equally enthusiastic girl. The authorities did not like this control of the terraces by the fans, as well as the pitch invasions at the last game of the season. Everything was outside their control which they needed a reason to stop.

About eight minutes before the end of our last home game in 1974 against Man City the United fans invaded the pitch. This was an effort to get the game abandoned. It had, after all, worked for Newcastle United fans when they invaded the field of play a few weeks earlier in their FA Cup tie against Nottingham Forrest. It did not work for us and the Blues finished 1-0 winners. There were no celebrations as no City fans worthy of note turned up.

Everybody in Manchester knew something would go down if United lost, it was another nail in the coffin of relegation. We did get relegated that year. The chant; “we’ll support you evermore” rang out of Old Trafford on and off the pitch. United were in the Second Division and this launched a rebirth. Tommy Docherty brought in some exiting new players, perhaps most notably was our signing from Hull City, Stuart Pearson (we’d walk a million miles, for one of your goals, oh Stuart). As Man Utd shot to the top of the league our attendances were the highest average of all four divisions beating Liverpool who actually won the First Division that year, 1974/75 season.

Crowds of 55-60,000 were regular at Old Trafford that season and continued the following seasons. United were on the march again playing fast attacking and entertaining football. We gained promotion back to the First Division at our first attempt. The Doc then bought Jimmy Greenhoff from Stoke City, a snip at £120,000, to add to our attack. playing just behind Pearson. With Steve Coppell and Gordon Hill on the wings, we were playing some of the finest football in the league.

After the pitch invasion against Man City the authorities, Football League, FA, and Government’s answer was to erect nine-foot fences to keep fans off the field of play and created a disaster waiting to happen. It took fifteen years for this to happen and in 1989 in an FA Cup Semi-Final involving Liverpool and Nottingham Forest at Sheffield Wednesdays Hillsborough stadium 97 Liverpool fans were, arguably, murdered by the authorities and their police force. The history of the Hillsborough Disaster is well documented. The net result of this terrible incident is the soulless all seater stadia we have today. Even though the Taylor Report into Hillsborough virtually exonerated standing of any blame - the police were culpable not the terraces for the crush - the authorities still went ahead with the cultureless all-seaters. This was a way of increasing profits, charging four times as much for a seat as the old terracing, getting rid of many working-class supporters who could no longer afford the entry price, and jibbing in was no longer an option. Oor many fans would not attend out of political principle. The entire culture of the game is now fucked, a culture which had lasted over 100 years just so these greedy bastards can amass even greater profits.

Late in the nineteen-seventies came the idea of crowd segregation for big games. Manchester United, the hooligan supporters of the decade according to the media. Away games from home were made all ticket affairs. This was an attempt by the authorities to keep the rival fans apart as United supporters had the habit of going on the home team's fans end; for example the Kop at Anfield a couple of times.

To counter this many Man Utd fans began traveling to the home team’s ground, weeks in advance, to purchase tickets for the home fans section of the ground. In London. For the “Cockney Reds” this was not hard. They all had London accents so those selling tickets at, say Arsenal, had no idea those who were purchasing the tickets were not Arsenal fans, but Manchester United supporters. This ploy worked for a few seasons till the authorities caught themselves on and the home clubs, in many instances, wanted proof of the supporter’s identity.

All that said it was a culture which has now gone, murdered by high finance and the money trick. It is unlikely those days will ever return as many of today’s younger supporters will not remember terracing. I feel sorry for them, they, through no fault of their own have missed out on great days irrespective of who your team was. I am speaking from a Man Utd view but I am sure the supporters of Liverpool, Newcastle, Sunderland, Spurs and many other clubs have their tales to tell. It made the world revolve on its axis.

Today I look at games and see greedy owners like the Glazers followed by daft rule changes like VAR. FA Cup ties decided on the day by penalties whereas previously a replay on a neutral ground was played. The game is a shadow of its former self, all seater stadia, fake scenes before the game and phoney atmospheres in many instances. The genuine article, football, has gone for ever and I consider myself lucky to have experienced those electric days.
 
Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Death of a Culture 👥 Murder by High Finance 🎬 Act Ⅱ

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ When I was a lad football made the world go round. 

Throughout working-class areas of England, Scotland, and Wales (the six-counties were a different scenario, a war was raging) various cultures from Pigeon Racing, Greyhound racing and training, to keeping and breeding whippets and bare-knuckled fights were present in many areas but the overarching meaning of life was football.

As the late great Bill Shankly, our nemesis but well respected, once remarked, ”football is more than a game, it is a matter of life and death.” Very true Bill because that was literally the case! All we lived for were Saturday afternoon and Tuesday or Wednesday nights if we had a game. Missing a match, come what may, was not an option. All that mattered in life for me was Manchester United FC, and all which went with following them. School and later work came secondary to the match and we had no time for those middle-class irks who claimed to support a team but never took the trouble to go to games, “part time supporters” of the highest order in our view were these despicable souls. It didn’t matter who the team was and where the fan or fans may have lived as long as they attended games was all that counted.

For example, a couple of lads from Aberdeen, Scotland, travelled regularly down to watch York City play, a fourth division side, now that was dedication! Standing on the terraces and being part of the culture as the atmosphere built up created by the fans themselves was almost as important as the game itself. My team, as mentioned, is Manchester United and back in those days I would be at every game, home, away and abroad, even friendlies, plus occasional reserve and junior games. On our travels, we would often get into altercations with the supporters of Liverpool, West Ham, Leeds etc, it was all part of the ‘awayday’. 

The London based Man Utd fans, the Cockney Reds who were a law unto themselves, would regularly be fighting at Euston station on their way to Manchester because invariably one of the London clubs would be playing up north. Chelsea or Tottenham could be playing away at Everton or Sheffield for example so for them the day started before boarding the 7.45 to Manchester. The girls were as fanatical as were the lads, though in those days they were a minority, but those who did go were as barmy as their male counterparts. The packed terraces often provided an opportunity for sexual encounters between the lads and lasses as the terraces of the Stretford End at Old Trafford, the Kippax at Maine Road, the Kop at Anfield I dare say and the Gwladys Street End at Goodison provided perfect cover for a quick shag!! Urinating at half time was often done on the terraces as getting out to the toilet (bog, or trap stones) was easier said than done. Great days, great times.

Football was also a means of keeping fit. We all had local teams and played on the local green or in the street. Traffic was not as busy in the sixties and seventies as today and playing football in the street was a regular pastime. ‘Gratey’ was another version of football we played, involving two players and, as the name suggests, a grate or drain at the side of the road built into the kerb acted as goals and the ball was either a stone or a tennis ball. The tennis ball was the right circumference to stick in the grate if a player scored. Scrubbed knees were regular wounds suffered but crying to mammy was not allowed. We were all in our junior years in those days. I can still hear various mother’s voices, including mine, calling out, “get your arse in its school tomorrow” on those summer nights when we were playing football. Nobody took any notice of the first call but eventually a hand would grab the back of the neck and being dragged physically homeward was always the net result. 

There were five-a-side games played indoors and the ball could not go above head height. These were often on TV. A midweek sports programme called ‘Sports Night with Coleman’ was aired and presented by a great commentator of his day, David Coleman on BBC1. I can remember back in the early seventies Manchester United being on in the five-a-side final at the Empire Pool, Wembley. United fans caught the authorities off guard as about two thousand turned up. This was unprecedented at these games, usually watched by local neutrals. Not on this occasion, it was like a mini-Old Trafford indoors and as United had a shite season this tournament became a magnet for United fans. These were great days and a great culture ruined by the murderous aims of big business greed in modern times.

The nineteen-sixties and seventies could be described as the age when modernism came to the younger generation of the times. On the beaches of Southern English seaside towns in the early sixties mods and rockers would fight it out, often ruining people’s holidays. Another culture, or sub-culture, was also developing and that was the football fan of the times. Skinhead gangs (in those days multi cultured and mixed raced, unlike the gangs of the eighties) in the sixties were just beginning to appear on the streets along with a sub-division called Boot Boys and these gangs were replacing the immediate post-war Teddy Boys. Most of these new gangs were football fans and introduced something to the terraces, the terrace chant. Singing at matches had gone on long before but not in the coordinated way these newcomers mastered on the terraces. Hitherto most songs were sung by individuals in public houses, now they were brought to the terraces. 

The old school cloth cap brigade of the forties and fifties was slowly and, I might add, reluctantly making way for the teenage revolution. At the 1963 FA Cup Final played out between Manchester United and Leicester City, United winning 3-1 with two goals from David Herd and one from new signing Denis Law, the British national anthem was played for the last time after the game. From then on, the anthem would be played before the FA Cup Final kick off. The reason for this was the United fans celebrating their team’s victory, five years after the Munich tragedy, would not keep quiet and just kept singing in chorus their own anthems which had fuck all to do with the monarchy, apart from Denis Law being King! This was also the first game to be played under an all-covered Wembley Stadium so the roof acted as an amplifier thus giving the vocalists, thousands massed on the terraces, great acoustics. This was also the age of the wall art, or graffiti as some of our detractors wished to call it, the spray painting of whose team ruled and whose end was the ‘hardest’ began appearing on walls and buildings around large inner cities. On one estate in the early seventies on the wall surrounding a working-class enclave in Manchester was written; MUFC LOYAL SUPPORTERS WE RULE thus advising any visitor this was a United fans estate. Other club’s supporters did similar in their areas, Bootle for example in Liverpool, or Wallsend in Newcastle.

Songs on the terraces of the sixties and seventies were, in many cases, works of lyrical art. The imagination and changing of words to the airs of many chart-topping hits of the day were something which the bourgeois elements who attend football grounds today could only marvel at! It was very much a working-class cultural thing of the times. Teenagers would often spend their school hours writing a song for Saturday's game, handing out their finished work at the Stretford End at Old Trafford or the Kop at Anfield turnstiles for consideration during the game. Some caught on, others did not. Whether the person's work was used or not, there can be no doubt a lot of imagination was used in composing them. An example of such imagination would be a remake of Max Boyce’s Welsh Rugby Song: Singing for the Songs Arias, our version Singing for the Munich Martyrs would go along these lines:

Down to Arsenal we did go for our annual trip
a weekend out in London Town without a bit of kip, 
two seats reserved for beer by the boys from Wythenshawe,
and it was beer, pontoon, crisps and fags and the King is Denis Law. (Chorus) 

And we were singing, for the Munich Martyrs, of Man Utd the Busby Babes. 

Into Euston we did roll with an empty crate of ale, 
Ron had lost at cards again and flogged his Daily mail, 
but he still looked very happy, and we all knew what for,
he’d swapped a photo of his wife for a picture of Denis Law (chorus). 

There were many more verses but the reader will get the level of imagination and this was only one of many Manchester United supporter’s songs of that era.

Many of the songs which reverberated from the terraces at Old Trafford and, I understand Anfield, were composed by the fans themselves. Many a school hour was spent writing songs for Saturdays game at the educational establishments of both Manchester and Merseyside. Liverpool fans tended to look to the very popular Merseybeat during the sixties for their inspiration, and many an altered version of popular songs could be heard on the Kop each Saturday.

At Old Trafford United fans tended to use any music, not least Irish republican songs such as “We’re off to Dublin in the Green, in the green” was altered in 1968 to “We’re off to Europe in the Red, in the Red, Denis Law will dazzle in the sun," to compose their songs around. Another one was Mary Hopkin’s 1968 hit “Those were the Days my Friend” which I understand was after a trip to Leeds who had just opened their new impressive Kop behind one goal, the Gelderd End, which Man Utd fans got on in 1968, repeated the following season 1969, “Those were the days my friend, we took the Gelderd End" became an altered version for many Reds something Leeds fans still have not forgot. It was altered again many times to accommodate a team’s end United fans took. 

It was a cultural pastime away from home, taking the host teams fans territory. At the Etihad, modern home of Manchester City, the song Blue Moon adopted by the Kippax Blues back in the day, Man City’s huge popular terrace at Maine Road is now sang by another very expensive PR man working for a company employed by the club. United fans list of songs in those days was limitless. After Arsenals FA Cup Final victory at Wembley over Liverpool in 1971, winning 2-1 (and the league FA Cup domestic double) in extra time with a blistering shot from Charlie George. The Arsenal fans made up a song, “he shot, he scored, and all the North Bank roared Charlie George, Charlie George, he shot, he scored….”

Today in the soulless stadia which were once our homes, full time PR companies are employed by the club owners like the Glazers to create an artificial atmosphere once created by the fans ourselves. At Old Trafford some burke sings Glory, Glory Man Utd and encourages fans to join in, what a fucking joke, who is this comedian nicking our songs and regurgitating them for supporters to sing along to? At Anfield many of us may have seen the flags on the stand which was once the Spion Kop before the game. These flags do not belong to the fans but the PR company who give them out to supporters sat in strategic places to maximise effects on TV. Once kick off has been blown these flags are taken back into storage for the next opportunity. Watch closely the next time a Liverpool night game is televised live as stewards can be seen taking these flags away. When Liverpool score at the one-time Kop End there are no flags, just scarves and they are less in number than the days of yore. All the scenery before the game, once genuine, are phoney. 

At Old Trafford singing anti-Glazer songs are banned, not that it makes much difference, and wearing anti-Glazer scarves is not allowed. One employee was dismissed for wearing the green and yellow scarf, which is the old colours of Newton Heath, Manchester United’s former name, because it was seen as being anti-Glazer. The once mighty and feared Stretford End is now becoming a joke, as is the Kop at Liverpool, the Gwladys Street at Everton, in fact all the old popular working-class cultural havens across the game. The end of an era as today’s game and atmosphere at any of the once mighty grounds is no match for the sixties, seventies and eighties.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Death of a Culture 👥 Murder by High Finance 🎬 Act Ⅰ

Caoimhin O’Muraile 🔖☭ This book, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, is an essential read for all who consider themselves socialists and, indeed, those who do not but are interested in politics.


Written by Robert Tressell (real name Robert Noonan) it tells the story of a group of building workers working for the firm Rushton and Co. (an apt name) in the town of Mugsborough (Hastings) in the early years of the 20th century. The book is a semi-autobiography written by Robert Noonan based very much on his own experiences. He chose the name Robert Tressell which is the name used as the author of the work. It sums up working conditions and practices of Edwardian Britain based purely on exploitation, bullying and ‘scamping the work’ simply for profit.

The book in parts is wildly thought to have had an influence on the 1945 UK General Election result which for the first time brought in a majority Labour administration led by Clement Attlee. Atlee’s programme was broadly socialist with manifesto promising a Welfare State, including a National Health Service and an end to the means testing for state benefits in the event of unemployment. It heralded in a new era of British politics basing the economy on the works of the liberal economist, John Maynard Keynes. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists has been described as instrumental for this landslide victory of the then progressive if not exactly revolutionary, in its violent overthrowing of capitalism sense, Labour government. This was despite the fact that the full work was not published until 1955 by Lawrence and Wishart. Bt parts of the work, much written in pencil in Noonan’s spare time, were put together in some condensed versions before this date, hence ten years previous having a bearing on the election result.

The book is humorous, tragic and certainly very political, and explains the principles of socialism without the hard work of reading the works of Karl Marx. The working conditions of the men working on the site, renovating an old house, The Cave, owned by a Mr Adam Sweater, a friend of Mr Rushton the owner of the building firm Rushton and Co a man who knew absolutely nothing about the industry he claimed to be a leading light of. It was here at The Cave where the men were slave driven all day by the firm's Foreman, Mr Hunter or ‘Nimrod’ as he was called behind his back by the hands. Employed at The Cave were painters, plasterers, plumbers, bricklayers and general labourers, who Hunter harangued threatened and sacked. Mr Rushton paid as little in the form of wages he could get away with while demanding the maximum output from the men. Many of those employed by the firm were not in fact tradesmen at all but could at best be described as semi-skilled. Among those who were tradesmen was Frank Owen, a skilled painter who could also perform specialised work. He was an old school painter trained well by another craftsman. The names of the characters are all very appt and sum up the relative alternative use and meaning for their names.

Bob Crass was the foreman painter though he knew very little about the trade except how to ‘scamp’ or rush the work and grovel to the Foreman. Crass alternatively means ‘stupid’ which this character certainly was. The Foreman, Mr Hunter or ‘Nimrod’ was named such because he was always hunting or stalking the men always looking for an excuse to either sack a man or reduce his wages even further. If he could sack a full price man, he could bring in a ‘makeshift’ worker who was perhaps not fully qualified but could, for example, splash some paint over the wall. This way he could pay him below price thus saving the firm money but charging the customer full price for tradesmen’s work. 

One man outside Hunters reach was Frank Owen, who was a skilled man and more than that he was competent and took pride in his work. Other characters were Joe Philpot, who liked a drink and a full pot of ale, Will Easton and his wife, Ruth, who took in a lodger, a Bible thumper, as was Mr Hunter, named Slyme. Again appropriate names with dual interpretations. The good Christian (I think not) Slyme had an affair with Ruth Easton making her pregnant and therefore terrified of what her husband would say or how he would react. Slyme, the Bible thumping hypocrite, was a supposed workmate of Will Easton whose wife he had impregnated. Another tragic character is the young supposed apprentice, Bert White who was basically used by Rushton and Co as unpaid hard labour. There are many other characters, some hilarious, some sad others tragic but all relevant to the times. People like the ‘Semi-Drunk’, the ‘Besotted Wretch’ and the petit bourgeois ‘Old Dear,’ the pub landlord, all add to complete the novel.

Frank Owen was also a socialist which was why Mr Hunter despised him but could do nothing about it. Owen, probably named after Robert Owen, the socialist and industrialist who helped form the Grand National Consolidated Trade Union (GNCTU) back in the 19th century and formed a workers cooperative in Lanarkshire, Scotland. Owen spent tireless hours trying to convince the slave driven hands that there was a better way to run the world's affairs. A way based on cooperation and mutual help and a harmonious life called socialism. The underpaid, underfed hands were all hostile to this concept of Owen’s, many considering him “a bloody fool”. Perhaps the most hostile to Owen’s thinking was the foreman painter, Bob Crass. Crass considered himself a good friend of Mr Hunter, which he was not as Nimrod had no friends, and because the Foreman, Hunter, allowed Crass to help out in the firms undertaking side of business Crass considered himself well in with the bosses! Owen described the principle of exploitation in the most basic way to make the concept easier for the men to understand. Crass constantly tried to outflank Owen, with absolutely no success, with articles from his daily read; The Daily Obscurer a paper which, as the title suggests, obscures the readers already infantile mind from anything approaching the truth.

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists has had a huge impact over the years in changing people’s political outlooks and opinions. Many would-be onetime fascists have become socialists after reading this book. Perhaps a famous example of such a transformation of political position is that of the actor and onetime trade unionist, Ricky Tomlinson. Tomlinson was given a two-year prison sentence in 1972 for his part in the first national construction workers strike Britain had ever seen. He and another union activist and construction worker, Des Warren, were jailed for two years. However, prior to Tomlinson’s involvement in socialist and trade union activities he was, under his own admission, a member of the fascist National Front (NF) in Britian. He was inspired at the time by Enoch Powells ‘rivers of blood’ speech in 1968. What completely transformed his views and political position, making him an ant-fascist, was reading The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists so influential is the read. Ricky Tomlinson is now a member of ‘Socialist Labour’ with Arthur Scargill, the former miner’s union leader.

The book is considered by many, including myself, to be the socialist bible and describes in a humorous though sometimes sad, regards the story, and informative way the principles of socialist politics and economics without the hard work of Marx’s Das Kapital. Perhaps some of Britain’s contemporary Labour MPs should read this book and have a rethink about the modern Labour Party’s position and how far off the track, derailed, they have become!

Critics of the book say things like ‘oh yes that was all very well over a hundred years ago but things are not like that now’. Really? The principles applied by Tressell in this work are as applicable today as they were then. People are still grafting for starvation wages, are still without a roof over their heads, are still exploited just as the hands were in the town of Mugborough. The only aspect which has changed is the advancement of the means of production, something which under socialism would benefit the whole of humankind, but under capitalism only advances the interests and profits of the employers.

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists is available in many bookshops including the Communist Party of Ireland shop, Connolly Books in Essex Street, Temple Bar Dubin, the Sinn Fein Book Shop (or it once was stocked there), Parnell Square Dublin and many other shops. A recommended read for all students of politics not just socialists, after all, we are the ‘converted’ but those who may consider themselves ideologically removed from socialism, like Ricky Tomlinson once was. Tomlinson is not alone in his complete change of political position. I personally know of former fascist sympathisers who are now vehemently anti-fascist often fighting them on the streets. Many will tell you one of the greatest influences in their change was reading The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists.

Robert Tressell, 2012,  The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists. Publisher: ‎Wordsworth Editions. ISBN-13: ‎978-1840226829

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ It has recently been brought to the attention of the public of trouble in the Unionist camp in the six counties. 

The controversary surrounds Jefferey Donaldson, the former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). Donaldson was also once a prominent member of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) when he had a falling out with then party leader, the late David Trimble over the latter’s support for the Good Friday Agreement (GFA). 

Back in 1983 and 1986 Jeffery Donaldson was the election campaign agent for the UUP candidate, the former far right Conservative and Unionist Party member and MP, Enoch Powell. Powell defected to the UUP back in the early eighties leaving the Tory party for a political restart in the six counties as a unionist. Powell was the man who made Hitlerite speeches about immigration in Britain and immigrants in general, claiming in a somewhat lunatic way that “rivers of blood” would flow if immigration did not cease. Donaldson obviously felt he had something in common with this racist, thus becoming his election agent.

In 2003 Donaldson left the UUP defecting to the party’s main rival the DUP under the stewardship of religious nutter, the late Ian Paisley. Paisley was also an opponent, at the time, of the GFA shouting or perhaps ranting would be a better term; Never, Never, Never! By this the firebrand meant never would he accept the GFA. Paisley, the man of God he would have us all believe did more to stoke up sectarian hatreds among an already volatile Protestant population than perhaps any other man. Jefferey Donaldson obviously felt he had more in common politically with the likes of the bigot Paisley and the racist Powell than the slightly more moderate brand of unionism in the UUP. Donaldson was also a member of the Orange Order and had served as a Corporal in the Ulster Defence Regiment, the successors to the murderous B. Specials.

Paisley eventually came to accept, if not at first embrace the GFA becoming the six county Stormont Assembly’s inaugural First Minister. Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness was the Deputy First Minister and the pair became known, at least in public, as the “Chuckle Brothers”. How much genuine likeness the men had for each other is anybody’s guess. Was this “Chuckle Brothers” purely for the general public? As the DUP entered Stormont so too did Donaldson even though he claimed to oppose the GFA. Between 2008 and 2009 he became a Junior Minister in the Stormont Assembly under the then leader, Peter Robinson who had succeeded Ian Paisley. In 2022 Jefferey Donaldson was once again elected to the ‘Northern Ireland Assembly but he subsequently chose to remain as a Westminster MP, rather than ‘double job’, with Emma Little-Pengelly taking his seat and is now the Deputy First Minister after Sinn Fein's Michelle O’Neil.

In March 2024 Donaldson stepped down as leader of the DUP having been charged with rape and historical sexual offences. The party immediately suspended his membership from the DUP. These are very serious charges and at the moment that is all they are, charges. As we are supposedly all equal before the law -  a myth which has developed in the annals of liberal democracy over the years and that is all this equality before the law is, a myth - it would come as no surprise if these charges against a Knight of the realm aren’t dropped. However, at the moment these allegations of rape are very much on the table and time will tell whether my sceptical approach bears any fruit. The fact is, whether I agree with any of Jefferey Donaldson’s policies, which I do not, or any other of the DUP’s 16th century Christian beliefs, is of no consequence,. H is still entitled, as are all of us, to the presumption of innocence until proved guilty if he is. Donaldson strongly denies these allegations so will, as things stand, be pleading not guilty it must be assumed.

Whether he is found guilty or not where does this leave ‘Ulster Unionism’? Jeffrey Donaldson has been a high-profile member of the two largest unionist parties, the UUP and DUP so in the event of a guilty verdict will there be an investigation by his former colleagues in the UUP as to whether he was up to these games while a member of their organisation? The third party of mainstream unionist politics is the much smaller Traditional Unionist voice (TUV). This group appear much more militant than either the UUP or DUP and are led by a firebrand, bordering on lunacy, called Jim Allister. At the moment the TUV are unaffected by the allegations against Donaldson and depending how far these investigations go the UUP can certainly not sit comfortably.

The other smaller parties in the Unionist/Loyalist camp are the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) who aligned very closely with the loyalist paramilitary group the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). The other loyalist party is the Ulster Political Research Group, formerly the Ulster Democratic Party formed by the Ulster Defence Association (UDA)/Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) and the Red Hand Commando. Irrespective of the outcome of the Donaldson investigations the result is hardly likely to affect either of these two small groups in any negative way. If he is found guilty, thus throwing mainstream unionism into turmoil that could have positive electoral results for these two smaller organisations.

Guilty or innocent, Jefferey Donaldson will not be the first well known politician to be brought down by scandal involving sex. In 1963 Jack Profumo, Minister for War, was brought down after his affair with escort girl, Christine Keeler. Keeler was also sleeping with Profumo’s opposite number in the Soviet Union, a situation which could not be allowed to continue. Later on Liberal Leader, Jeremy Thorpe. although acquitted,  was brought down after it was discovered he was having a homosexual affair, something which at the time was very much frowned upon. There were also allegations of child abuse against Margaret Thatcher’s Government, according to the Derry Journal; “former Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, was aware of rumours linking a senior MP with the sexual abuse of young boys but did nothing”. Thatcher soon had such reports quashed!

Jeffrey Donaldson must be afforded a fair trial, if that is possible, and by given the presumption of innocence until proven beyond all reasonable doubt otherwise. Once this rule is overlooked or dumped then the legal system is really in trouble. In many cases in both the 26 and 6 counties trial by jury have long been done away with for the trials of Irish Freedom Fighters, will they one day extend this even more unfair system to civilian trials. Such a violation of human rights has already been caried out in the twenty-six-counties against ‘Thomas Slab Murphy’ who was tried in the non-jury Special Criminal Court on income tax charges. This is something human rights activists should be watching closely because if they, the so-called authorities can get away with this once with no public outcry, they can do it time and time again.

Whatever the outcome of the Donaldson trial, assuming there will be one, it will be interesting to see where it leaves ‘Ulster Unionist’ politics in the future. Could it give nationalist parties, Sinn Fein and the SDLP more votes? Could it strengthen Alliance Party or the appeal of the two smaller loyalist parties in the future? Time will tell and whatever the outcome the political landscape in the six counties will be worth keeping an eye on!

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Is ‘Ulster Unionism’ In Turmoil?

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ Over the years women have rightly so fought for their rights often supported by their male colleagues. 

From the days of the “Women’s Social and Political Union”, the Suffragettes and the fight for the vote to more resent campaigns for equality in various walks of life. The WSPU were formed in 1903, Manchester, by Emmeline Pankhurst and unlike their predecessors, or parent organisation it could be argued, the Suffragists were predominantly, though not exclusively working-class women. 

The Suffragettes' main reason for existence was to secure the vote for all women, especially the working-class which is where they differed from the earlier middle-class, Suffragists or officially the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies formed by Millicent Garrett Fawcett in the mid-19th century. The Suffragettes also took more than a passing interest in the working conditions endured by women as the second Industrial Revolution moved along. In 1913 Suffragette, Emily Davidson, threw herself under the King's horse at the Epsom Derby forcing the abandonment or postponement of the race but costing Emily her life. The WSPU believed in violent means to achieve their goals including petrol bombing MPs homes and throwing bricks at policemen. When put in prison the women went on hunger strike and were often force fed using inhuman methods, a tactic used by the British on Irish republican prisoners later on.

The NUWSS or Suffragists as they were commonly known were much more peaceful than the latter Suffragettes. Their methods included petitions and talking nicely to male MPs about women’s suffrage. They were made up of middle-class women and their campaign was for the vote for middle-class women with property qualifications over the age of thirty. They cared little for the use of violence and actually opposed such methods later adopted by the working-class Suffragettes. They cared equally little for the plight of working-class women or their right to vote which the Suffragists believed working-class women should not get. In 1918 under the “Representation of the People Act” the aims of the bourgeois Suffragists were reached when the vote was granted to women with property qualifications over the age of thirty. Not until 1928, in Britian, did women get universal suffrage. In the 26 counties all women received the vote in 1922 after the formation of the Irish Free State.

Today we see women’s groups not fighting for the vote but for equality. These groups are based very much on class lines in much the same way as the earlier models outlined above were. The orthodox or bourgeois feminists are middle-class driven and show little interest in their working-class co genderists working in sweatshops for shit wages. The orthodox feminists are more about promoting women’s equality in the Boardroom or in the financial sector such as banking. It could well be argued, in fact I would argue, that many of the bourgeois feminist demands have been met and even surpassed. For example women executives in large companies are now common place and many of these women can be and often are tyrannical as employers or managers. Some of these women with their new found powers are not and perhaps never were looking for equality but superiority over their male counterparts. In many boardrooms they have achieved this aim beyond doubt. If anybody watched the series; Mr Bates Vs the Post Office it could not be failed to notice most of the lying bosses in the Post Office who were persecuting and prosecuting the Sub-Post Masters, were in fact women. One of them even went to church preaching for the God Squad as a Deaconess on Sunday before returning to her full-time post of lying through her teeth on Monday. 

Not all the management team were women, there were men equally as culpable but much less convincing. This is just one example but as a former trade union negotiator and supporter of women’s rights and equality I did find negotiating with women bosses a harder job than negotiating with men as women tended to believe they had the right to ride rough shod over long-standing agreements. In many London local authorities most Senior Personnel Officers were, and no doubt still are, women with men as their juniors. The way some of these female Hitlers spoke to their underlings can only be described as misandry and if the boot was on the other foot there would be cries of misogyny from the roof tops. So in this area in many cases women have achieved not only equality, and rightly so, but superiority. Equality means the clock stops at six o’clock not five to six or five past six, but on the hour of six. This divides the clock into two ‘equal’ halves.

In the financial sector, Banking in particular, many managers are now women, that is if you can ever see a Bank manager, male or female, so it could be argued the middle-class feminist movement have made gains in this department. They appear to have no interest, apart from exploiting, working-class women or their plight.

In the world of parliamentary politics women have achieved a lot with Britain having had three female Prime Minister in a comparatively short period of time since 1979. This must reflect the advances women have made in this area. In Ireland Sinn Fein, the largest party in the six counties and the main opposition party in the 26 county Dail are led by two women, Mary Lou McDonald who is national SF President, and Michelle O’Neil, Vice President and leader of the party in the six counties. The Irish Labour Party is now led by a woman, Ivana Bacik and the Social Democrats are also led by a woman, Holly Cairns. Many independent TDs are women as the Dail slowly fills up with women TDs. This is progressive and if these women show the electorate that they have what it takes, that is in a liberal democratic sense where whoever spouts the most convincing hot air gets the backing of the electorate, and are elected then that’s good enough. 

This liberal democracy bollocks applies to men and women alike. In Germany since unification the first woman Chancellor, Angela Merkel, held office for sixteen years. All across the globe in various so-called parliaments women are ascending to the top positions. In the United States although there has not yet been a female President women and women’s voices can be heard increasingly around Congress. So in this department women have made huge gains, but they can only make these steps forward if elected. A far cry from Constance Markievicz becoming the first woman elected to the Westminster Parliament and Nancy Aster the first woman MP to take her seat in the same building. Markievicz was elected on an abstentionist platform in the 1918 general election for Sinn Fein. In the same election Sinn Fein stood another woman for East Belfast, her name was Winifred Carney, the former Secretary to trade union organiser and revolutionary, James Connolly. Carney was also a former member of the Irish Citizen Army. This was at a time when women entering elections, let alone getting elected was unheard of.

So, many gains have been made in the areas briefly outlined above. The orthodox feminist movement have achieved and even surpassed in some areas their goals. It must be wondered now, what exactly are these bourgeois Feminists ultimate aims, equality or superiority for women?

The gains made by women at the higher end of society are in stark contrast to the virtually non-existent advances made at the lower end. Marxist Feminists, the militant end of the working-class women’s movement have had a much less impact on the employers or society. This is no coincidence as the demise in trade union power weakens their arm also declines certainly in Britian. Marxist Feminists view women’s liberation in its true form as part of the overall class struggle. However, that does not mean women’s rights in the workplace should not be fought for on a daily basis. Many of these rights are denied working-class women by female bosses and CEOs whose lofty position is very much down to bourgeois Feminist groups and their bourgeois male supporters pressurising over the years. Many of these female middle-class bosses are bullies, this I have witnessed first-hand, bullying frightened female workers terrified of losing their jobs!

Back in 1976 until 1978 at the Grunwick Film Processing Plant in London a strike took place. It lasted two years and much police violence was meted out to pickets, many of them Asian Women. The strike was called over the dismissal of Devshi Bhudia from his job at the plant. The strike was also over union recognition and the right to negotiate. Many of those on strike, in fact a majority, were women many of them Asian migrant workers. Where were the orthodox Feminist groups then to fight for these women? Nowhere, nowhere to be seen or heard. Fortunately trade unionists from around the country rallied to the call including then Yorkshire NUM President, Arthur Scargill, who led thousands of miners onto the picket line alongside these women. Indian born Jayaben Desai, a striking woman and trade unionist, said: “The strike is not so much about pay, it’s a strike about human dignity”. The outcome of the strike was a House of Lords ruling that the employer did not have to recognise the union or negotiate. The employer did not have to reinstate workers, despite the Scarman Report recommending such compromises by the employer be made.

Another point of exploitation of workers and women in particular is the contract cleaning industry. Some women are working for a pittance of a wage having to do three or four jobs for these cowboy employers, what about equality here? Many supervisors in this industry are women from the petty bourgeois strata and bully their underlings, particularly migrant women workers. Where are the voices who cry so loud about women’s representation or, in their tunnel opinion lack of, in the higher echelons of society where are these people campaigning for the rights of young mothers having to work all hours to feed their children? Perhaps we should not only by looking at women’s equality with men but also women’s equality with women!

The early genuine pioneers of women’s rights at work, including union recognition and the right to a healthy working environment was fought for not by bourgeois feminist or Suffragist movements. These rights were fought for by the women workers and teenage girls, the working-class, at the Bryant and May match works factory in Bow, East London. This strike was almost unanimously women workers in 1888. This strike paved the way for what became known as ‘New Unionism’ meaning for the first-time unskilled workers could organise and win. Then, as now, the bourgeois Feminist groups could not care a fuck for their co-genderists in the working-class and they are out for women’s superiority, that is bourgeois women’s superiority which has little if anything to do with women’s equality across the board.
Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Women’s Equality or Superiority?

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ Energy prices in Ireland are slowly coming down again at long last. 

They are still well above their pre-covid prices but a small reduction has been noticed. The Covid 19 pandemic was blamed by the ever-profiteering energy companies for the first round of price hikes, why? What the fuck does a deadly pandemic have to do with putting up the price of energy? The only motive for the expense is to maintain and increase these ever-hungry company’s profits. They operate, as do most modern so-called businesses, on a profit-on-profit year on year basis, meaning each year profits have to increase on the previous twelve months. Any decrease on the previous year’s profits is regarded as a loss, which is not the case it just means profits are not as high. 

The pandemic affected everybody, so we were told. Working practices were changed as employees worked more and more from home, meaning less energy would be used lighting up and heating places of work. Surely this should have resulted in a lowering of prices, shouldn’t it? Surely if less energy output is required, and, as we were unreliably informed, we “were all in the same boat regards the pandemic” this would include the energy companies across Ireland, it would be imagined, surely? Well, alas, not. These firms have to continue making huge profits on profits year on year pandemic or no pandemic. We are only supposed to be stupid enough to think “we are all in the same boat” but on a little closer examination we can see this not to be the case. Big business will continue to profit as big business is bigger than everything including a global pandemic. This is the nature of the capitalist economic world we are told is the finest available to human kind! What a load of crap, if this system is the finest man can come up with, I hate to see the worst political and economic system.

Since January 2021 there has been unprecedented uncertainty in the gas and electric market and a sustained rise in ‘wholesale gas prices’. This has resulted in increased energy prices for consumers here in Ireland and, in fact, around the globe. We are reliably informed:

the more gas generation a country has, the higher the bills. The majority of Irish electricity is generated by gas, followed by renewable energy, mostly from wind. Historical data from Ireland shows that higher demand and higher gas prices lead to higher electricity prices.

During Covid gas generation was lower due to industry using less, therefore the prices should have come down? In Ireland energy prices remain high as the rate in other EU countries fall. Why should that be? One report by independent economist, Simon Barry, tells us:

Irish homes continue to pay high prices for energy while European suppliers cut rates on the back of falling wholesale charges. Energy prices have more than doubled over the last two years, with families now paying up to 44 cent a kilowatt hour for electricity against about 18 cent in 2021. Gas and wholesale electricity prices have been falling here and in Europe since hitting an autumn peak, but Irish suppliers have been hedging deals, where they buy energy months in advance of selling it, prevent them from passing these cuts on to the customers. 

Pure fucking greed which should be legislated against, but please do not hold your breath waiting, they tell me suffocation is a terrible death. No capitalist government has the backbone to challenge these companies.

As the Covid affair appears, or again we are told, to be subsiding the energy prices are not following suit. Now the ever money grabbing energy firms have another bogey man to blame, Vladmir Putin. As the war in Ukraine drags on and on, the energy companies here keep their prices artificially high. They blame the price of gas as the Russian leader increases the wholesale price of Russian gas in response to sanctions imposed on him by the European Union. But surely, if Mr Barry’s report is correct, and there is no reason to doubt him, “gas and wholesale electricity prices have been falling here and in Europe” then Putin’s price of gas hikes should have a minimal effect on prices here. Firstly the energy firms here in Ireland blame Covid for their ever-greedy price increases then, low and behold, it is the war in the Ukraine and Putin! Whatever next, the fairies at the bottom of the garden, perhaps they are to blame? Or, perhaps because the price of grain in the Ukraine has risen, due again to the war, therefore our ever-benevolent energy companies have to increase the price of electricity! The price of bread maybe, but energy? It makes no sense, but is it supposed to? No, of course it isn’t we are supposed to swallow this crap without complaint! Unfortunately, that is exactly what we do! Well, more fools us is all I can say, myself included. It is noticeable to see that Benjamin Netanyahu’s genocide in Gazza does not get used as an excuse for rocketing energy prices!

The next time the so-called powers that be put the figures for inflation on the TV or in the papers, the question which should be asked is; are the prices of gas and electric included in these figures? The answer is, like property prices, no they are generally not included. This way they can artificially manipulate the inflation figures in a southern direction which, in turn, gives the employers a good reason not to award decent pay increases when the trade unions come knocking.

So, what can be done to stop these parasites keeping the energy prices synthetically high? The answer is to nationalise these companies taking them out of private profiteering hands. Nationalised industries are not supposed to make profits in fact the P. word stands for provisions. Provision of goods and services to cater for society’s needs. They could, and should, be run on a ‘not for profit’ basis which, it should be pointed out is not the same as ‘non-profit making’. Any surplus value under ‘not for profit’ after wages are paid and the upgrading of technology and combating depreciation in equipment are financed gets pumped back into the industry and not some greedy billionaires ever bulging bank balance. This way prices could be stabilised and people will pay the standard rate, not according to some fictitious market, but the real price to keep warm. 

Huge sections of Irish society are paid a heating allowance for the winter months, and recently a €35 per week electricity allowance is being paid to sections of Irish society, disabled people, those over retirement age. A generous allowance better than many capitalist governments would grant. It is not the allowance which is in any way the problem, and it certainly should not be snubbed. My argument is, would such monies not be better used as subsidies to keep energy bills as low as possible in a fully nationalised energy industry? This could be used as a stepping stone towards a fully integrated planned economy across all goods and services, providing for the needs of the population as a whole instead of the greed of the tiny minority. 

Society, politically and economically especially in a small country like Ireland could be organised so much better without the capitalist brigands taking all the cream. A starting point should be health and energy providing both for all, in the case of health care free at the point of need.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Nationalise The Energy Companies In Ireland

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭  The 1984/85 British Coal Miner’s Strike bore many similarities to the struggle which took place in Dublin seventy years previous, the 1913/14 Dublin Lockout. 

Not least of these similarities was the role played by women in both disputes, without which neither strike could have continued the length of time they did. 

In Dublin women like Delia Larkin, sister of ITGWU leader Jim Larkin, Rose Hackett, Constance Markievicz, Dr Kathleen Lynn, Christina Caffrey and many others staffed the vital soup kitchens which provided essential meals for the locked out and striking workers. Delia Larkin formed the Irish Women’s Workers Union (IWWU) who formed pickets independent of the main union involved, the Irish Transport and General Workers Union (ITGWU). Back in 1913/14 women as well as men were locked out of their employment and others were on strike in support. A very similar situation regarding the roles played by women applied in the Miner’s strike of 184/85.

Women Against pit Closures was formed by, among others, Anne Scargill, the wife of NUM President Arthur Scargill, which was the best known of the women’s groups but by no means the only one. Women’s Support Groups and Women’s Action Groups sprang up all over Britain both inside the mining communities, including Nottinghamshire where the majority of miners worked, and outside these areas. Many of these women were the wives, Sisters, Daughters and Girlfriends of striking miners. Others were not related but in most cases were active trade unionists or labour activists. Some women had no connection to the labour and trade union movement at all but could see the injustice of Thatcher’s plans to close coal mines and destroy communities. All the women involved deserve equal praise for their trojan work. Across the country, similar to Dublin in 1913/14, soup kitchens were opened by these women from the various groups and also doubled up as advice centres and NUM meeting places.

The advice centres, again the brainchild of the women’s action and support groups, were set up to give advice to miners who were in severe financial difficulty and were reluctantly contemplating a return to work. There was one notable case when the energy companies, gas and electric simultaneously threatened to cut off a striking miners energy supplies due to ‘bills outstanding’. The man in question who had been out on strike since the beginning approached his local advice centre to see what, if anything could be done. The local Women’s Action Group set up a large picket around the man’s house. When the energy companies came to disconnect him, they were met with a large group of angry women and thought better of their actions. They left leaving the striking miner with power and were not foolish enough to return. 

The NUM had sent letters to the trade unions representing the energy workers asking them not to disconnect miners who were on strike but, with a few exceptions, these letters were ignored. These workers were afraid of their own jobs if they refused management instructions to disconnect miners who had not paid their bills. However, when faced with the Women’s Action Groups they feared for their safety and wisely withdrew. The para fascist Thatcher had sequestrated the NUMs funds, effectively leaving the union penniless which meant they could not give strike pay. Scargill had wisely moved the unions assets out of the “Plutonium Blondes” reach but the union had no access to them. The NUM leadership, due to this sequestration received no wages even after the men had returned to work. The miners were paid by the National Coal Board (NCB) but the union fulltime officials wages came from the NUM funds. The leadership received no wages for almost a year after the strike ended!

The women’s groups formed their own picket lines and because they fell outside the jurisdiction of the NUM, TUC or any other trade union Thatcher’s laws on picketing did not apply. The law said no more than six pickets were allowed, not that the NUM took a blind bit of notice, but this law did not apply to the women’s groups.

Around the Pontefract area women’s support groups were working tirelessly in their attempts to force the local authority into increasing the clothing grant for miner’s children -  (Striking Similarities Kevin Morley P199). 

The monies for children’s grants came out of local authority funds and not central government, therefore initially Thatcher could do little to prevent local authorities giving these grants. The Government “were, however, cutting the benefits which strikers and their families could claim overall” (ibid). Thatcher cut benefits for children under the age of five, obviously feeling children of infant age did not need clothing! Only children over five could be claimed for regards clothing.

“The soup kitchens increased in importance as meeting places during the governments ‘back to work’ campaign” (Morley P200). It was here miners met to counter this campaign. The strike had a large impact on male attitudes towards women, hitherto one of a chauvinistic nature to say the least. Women’s attitudes towards women underwent a huge change in a positive way. “Anne O’Donnell, the wife of a Barnsley Miner recalled: ‘There's no way I would return to the kitchen sink now. I’m not going back to the way things were before’. Both me and my husband were both unpolitical before the strike” (Morley P.203) she said. Both her and her striking husband had both changed now they had witnessed at first hand the brutality of the British state. Remember this strike was not about pay but about saving jobs, pits and communities.

It was perhaps the way women put across the miner’s case against pit closures and the ruination of communities which gained support outside the mining areas. Perhaps women have a much more persuasive way of getting a message over which men lack? It was plain to see that in any class struggle the role of women is essential to stand any chance of victory. The roles played by women in both the 1913/14 Dublin Lockout and the 1984/85 British Coal Miners Strike must never be diminished or forgotten by the labour and trade union movements in Britain and Ireland alike. They were a credit to their class and gender.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

The Miners Strike 40 Years On – The Role Played By Women

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ The Miner’s Strike of 1984/85 was constitutionally legitimised by the enactment of Rule 41 of the Union rule book. 

The decision to enact Rule 41 and not hold a national strike ballot was taken democratically by delegates representing the whole of Britain’s coalfields from Scotland to Kent, including those areas where the membership wanted a ballot notably Nottinghamshire and the much smaller North Derbyshire areas. 

The delegates from these coalfields argued most forcefully for such a ballot but were voted down by the majority who favoured an area-by-area strategy using Rule 41. Despite this democratic vote around 80% of miners in Nottinghamshire broke the strike and worked despite their leaders asking them not to. The Nottinghamshire delegates, Henry Richardson and Ray Chadburn had argued at the NEC for a ballot, as was their members wishes and lost the vote. They then got behind the strike and apart from around 3,000 miners in Nottinghamshire were ignored, these miners were out on strike for the full twelve months of the dispute. 

In the early days of the strike flying ‘pickets’ had much success in closing the Nottinghamshire and North Derbyshire pits which was something Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, could not tolerate. Miner talking to miner did reap some rewards regards closing working pits. Thatcher then ordered what amounted to a ‘national police force’ as road blocks were set up and freedom of movement was curtailed to prevent ‘flying pickets’ entering Nottinghamshire. In the south the Blackwall Tunnel was closed in an attempt to stop Kent miners travelling north to Nottinghamshire. Other workers were inconvenienced by these road closures as commuters to London were often up to three hours late for work. The Government insisted the public were not inconvenienced by the strike: yet another lie - ask any employer whose staff were not clocking in on time!

The working miners in Nottinghamshire was a leading factor in the strike and it was not the first time the Nottinghamshire miners had broken a strike. They had a history of strike breaking dating back to the 19th century. The coal they dug kept the power stations running as non-union lorry drivers moved coal, they should have been ashamed of themselves. Back in 1893 the coal owners wanted to cut miners' wages because the price of coal had dropped. This resulted in a miners' lockout when the Miners Federation of Great Britain (MFGB), forerunner to the NUM, refused to accept the coal owners demands. The Nottinghamshire coal companies found they could still make a huge profit and therefore had no need to cut the miners wages in that area. This caused a split in the ranks of coal miners and half way through the dispute the Nottinghamshire men, not for the last time, returned to work. In 1926 the coal owners wanted to cut miner’s wages and lengthen their hours of work. The MFGB under the stewardship of Arthur James Cook were having none of it and once again the miners were locked out. The British Trades Union Congress called a general withdrawal of labour across Britain, the General Strike, which lasted nine days after which the TUC called the strike off leaving the miners to fight on alone. This time they were out for seven months, thanks in no small way to the cowardice of the TUC leadership.

During the General Strike of 1926 under the guise of carrying out maintenance work two pits, Clipstone and Blidworth, which had only recently started to dig coal worked throughout the strike. This was the thin end of what was to become a very ugly and thick wedge. By the end of August 1926 thousands of Nottinghamshire miners were returning to work forcing the area MFGB leadership, hitherto supportive of the strike, to do a u turn encouraging the men to return to their pits. This was then, as in 1984, because Nottinghamshire was a profitable coalfield, the ‘I’m all right Jack so fuck the rest of you’ attitude as the miners in this area once again scabbed and broke the strike. This, again as in 1984/85, caused a major split in the union as the Nottinghamshire men led by their leader, George Spencer a right-wing labour MP, formed their own union – the Nottinghamshire Miners Industrial Union (NMIU). This was also known as “Spencerism” and the scab union secured negotiating rights in the Nottinghamshire area. 

In 1984/85 history was to repeat itself when the majority of Nottinghamshire miners formed their own breakaway union, the Union of Democratic Mineworkers (UDM) led by Roy Lynk and David Prendergast, two former junior NUM officials. The UDM failed to save one single pit in the area despite helping Thatcher and the NCB defeat the NUM. The UDM was aided greatly by a leading confide of Thatcher’s, David Hart who arranged meetings for the new scab union in five-star plush hotels. Hart was a billionaire playboy and any miner who attended these meetings this man had organised could no longer claim they did not know what was afoot. Miners do not hold meetings in plush hotels, normally reserved for the rich and powerful for their meetings or when on holiday, which was and is most of the time. Although the working miners in Nottinghamshire and North Derbyshire were a factor in the failure of the strike, they were not the leading factor.

The National Association of Colliery Overseers Deputies and Shotfirers (NACODS) was the pit Deputies union. Under the law if a Deputy was not present at a pit, then that mine could not operate. This was the case in 1984/85 when the NACODS membership voted by a huge majority to join the strike. NACODS was a small but very influential union because, scabs or no scabs in Nottinghamshire, without a Deputy not a single pit could open. If NACODS had come out, as they were mandated to do, it was a game changer and Thatcher knew it - something had to be done to solve this headache. Thatcher berated NCB Chairman, Ian MacGregor, for his instruction to NACODS ordering them to cross NUM picket lines. This aggravated the Deputies union who ignored the instruction in line with their union policy not to cross another union’s picket lines. NACODS members had kept all pits open simply because the NUM could not picket every pit in the country. Most pits kept open were not working, but this instruction from the NCB Chairman was too much, NACODS members would not cross NUM picket lines.

NACODS balloted their members on joining the strike and around 83 percent voted in favour of strike action. This was a definite potential strike winner. This was a huge mandate for action and the date October 25th 1984 was pencilled in for the strike to commence” (Striking Similarities - Kevin Morley P 184). 

Thatcher and the Coal Board were worried and that is an understatement, something had to be done to avert this strike. If the NACODS leadership had carried out, as expected, their mandate every pit in the country including Thatcher’s lifeline in Nottinghamshire would be forced by law to close. Through the dictatorial actions of the NCB Chairman “the future of the Government was in their hands and they had to remedy their terrible mistake” (The Enemy Within Seumas Milne P17) the Prime Minister said. Another Tory defeat at the hands of the miners was a stark possibility, and given the fact Thatcher had called the strike in the first place deliberately for a showdown with the NUM it would have served them right. 

Thatcher ordered the NCB to come up with something to offer NACODS, nothing too committal which would have to be honoured in the future but something to keep the Deputies working. They offered NACODS a vague promise of a pit closure review, a very vague ambiguous offer which was enough to buy off most of the union leadership who called the strike off within 24 hours of receiving the offer. This was a very foolish decision by the leadership who did not consult their members, no outcry about ballots this time, and the deal made failed to save one Deputy's job. Obviously if a mine closes then there is no need for a Deputy, that is basic common sense. The NACODS leadership had been conned or, more to the point chose to be conned by the NCB and Government. Thatcher was bewildered as to why the NACODS leadership had been bought off so easily and saved her skin. The decision to call off the strike failed to save one single pit and all but wiped NACODS out as a union. There was much talk at the time of the more pliant union leaders being given ‘backhanders’ in financial inducement to sell their members out. Given the dirty nature of the tactics adopted by Thatcher and MacGregor this should come as no surprise.

The Prime Minister also used the spy agency MI5 to defeat the NUM. The Chief Executive Officer, Roger Windsor, was reportedly an MI5 agent placed inside the NUM higher echelons. The CEO was the only unelected position within the NUM leadership ranks and when Windsor applied, he sat a brilliant interview. He was one of MI5 Chief, Stella Rimmington’s, right hand men, something the spy agency denies but they would of course. They are not ging to admit who their agents are otherwise it defeats the object! It was Windsor who was photographed hugging Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi which he was not authorised to do. He had not been authorised by the NUM to meet Gaddafi at all let alone hug him, his role was to meet Libyan trade unions, not the country’s political leadership. This was done purposely by MI5 to put the miners in a bad light in the eyes of the public. It was only a few weeks after WPC Yvonne Fletcher had been shot dead outside the Libyan Embassy. Anti Libyan feeling was running high, something MI5 were fully aware of and utilised. They could not care a fuck about the dead policewoman but would use her tragic slaying to beat the NUM and Arthur Scargill in particular.

Despite the scabbing and betrayal of their members by NACODS leaders not one coal mine was saved. In Nottinghamshire Lynk and the UDM had been promised by Thatcher they would be rewarded for helping her. They were, every pit in Nottinghamshire closed despite this treachery by the scabs. Roy Lynk, who became Lord Lynk, was in tears as he pathetically pleaded with Thatcher not to close the pits, the same pits the closure of he had helped bring about.

In March 1985 after one year on strike the NUM called a delegates meeting where it was decided, by a small majority, to organise a return to work. Many rank and file miners were reluctant to follow this decision and many stayed out hoping to negotiate local deals at their pits to stop any victimisation of any miner who had been on strike for the year. It was noticeable to see that those crying for a strike ballot a year before were not demanding a ballot on returning to work. The miners returned to their pits behind their colliery brass bands heads held hight. It was an emotional sight to see as some men had tears in their eyes fighting hard to hold them back.

Next week a look at the vital role of women in the strike, something not seen since the 1913/14 Dublin Lockout in a trade dispute.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

The Miners Strike 40 Years On – Nottinghamshire And NACODS

Caoimhin O’Muraile ☭ March 6th will see the fortieth anniversary of the beginning of the British Coal Miner’s Strike. 

In fact that date is misleading because the strike actually began on 1st March at Cortonwood Colliery, South Yorkshire. It was here that at the quarterly coal review meetings involving local management and the mining unions, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), the National Association of Colliery Overseers, Deputies and Shotfirers (NACODS) and the administration white collar unions, affiliated to the NUM. 

It was at this meeting that National Coal Board (NCB) Area Director, George Hayes dropped the bombshell which would catapult the industry into the longest and most bitter dispute in British trade union history. The quarterly meeting took place next to Manvers Pit and it was usual to go through the pits in alphabetical order. However, that morning George Hayes:

indicated he wished to leave Cortonwood until last because there were special problems at the pit which required more attention and time (Striking Similarities Kevin Morley P.164). 

They went through the other collieries as was the norm at these review meetings and any exhausted pits. it was agreed by all concerned. would close - miners cannot mine clay! This, however was different, the pit in question was not exhausted, far from it, the pithead showers and other facilities were being refurbished to accommodate miners redeployed from exhausted areas.

George Hayes had been instructed by the NCB in London to take out 400,000 tons of coal from production, and this was to be done by the end of the financial year March 31st. As part of their preparations for a showdown with the NUM, the Coal Board followed instructions from the Thatcher Government to deliver this message, knowing it would provoke a backlash”  (Morley 165). 

The arguments Hayes put forward, manufactured or otherwise for this closure, was one of economics. The pit in question was uneconomical, which it must be pointed out - it was not the purpose of nationalised industries to be profitable or economical within reason. Nationalised industries, including coal, were never supposed to be profitable, the P word here did not stand for profit, but provision. It was this announcement, on behalf of the para-fascist Prime Minister, Thatcher, which sparked off the year-long coal strike which resulted in deaths of six people including three teenagers and misery for thousands along with countless false arrests.

The strike had its historical background in 1974, a decade earlier, when the NUM brought down the government of Edward Heath. Margaret Thatcher was a member of Heath's cabinet, Education Secretary, and she saw this defeat at the hands of primarily the miners as an insult to herself. She swore revenge and had the name Arthur Scargill etched on her mind ever since. Although back then the National President of the union was Joe Gormley it was the Yorkshire Area President, Arthur Scargill, who organised the ‘flying pickets’ to other industries helping bring about the downfall of Heath. On the back of the strike Heath went to the electorate on the question; ‘who runs the country?’ The country decided not him and returned by a slender margin Harold Wilsons Labour Party to government. Wilson settled the dispute on the miners' terms, granting them the pay increase they had demanded and, indeed, deserved having fallen behind in recent years to other groups of workers. 

A bitter and hate filled Margaret Thatcher waited for her chance, even if she had to lie through her teeth which she did ten years later. She succeeded Heath as leader of the Conservative Party after the 1974 election defeat. In 1979 Thatcher became Prime Minister and still had revenge for 1974 firmly in her sights irrespective of the damage she would cause.

‘Flying pickets’ began fanning out from Yorkshire after the Cortonwood bombshell, closing down Britain’s coal fields. On 6th March the strike was declared official by the NUM leadership which is why this date is misleadingly used as the starting date. There were demands from some areas for a national ballot, Nottinghamshire leading the charge for this. Let us be clear on this here and now, the strike was called by Thatcher who had calculated, correctly, that by closing a healthy pit like Cortonwood it would force the NUM to fight. No miner in their right mind would call a strike in the springtime for obvious reasons and Thatcher knew this, therefore she called it for them. 

The media dutifully and once again wrongly accused Scargill of calling the strike to deliberately undermine the government. This was a lie. The NUM leadership of Arthur Scargill, National President, Peter Heathfield, National Secretary, and Mick McGahey, leader of the Scottish miners and NUM Area President in Scotland, called a special delegates meeting of the National Executive Committee (NEC) for 19th April to discuss strategy and the possibility of a national strike ballot. Both Scargill and Heathfield did not get a vote here as they were not delegates, McGahey got a vote as a delegate for the Scottish miners. In the words of Arthur Scargill:

our special conference was held on 19th April. McGahey, Heathfield and I were aware from the feedback that a slight majority of the areas favoured the demand for a national ballot; therefore we were expecting and had prepared for that course of action with posters, ballot papers and leaflets. A major campaign was ready for a ‘yes’ vote in a national strike ballot. 

This dispels the myth propagated by Thatcher and the media that Scargill had banned or “forebode” a “national ballot”. The leadership were prepared for such a ballot having got the machinery at the ready and were surprised by the NEC vote against a national ballot in favour of Rule 41.

At these special delegate meetings delegates from all over Britain’s coalfields all areas received a vote on whether to hold a national ballot or endorse Rule 41 of the NUM rule book. Rule 41 allows for an area-by-area strike without the need for a national ballot. It is the duty of any member of any trade union to abide by the union rule book and the NUM was no exception. It is also the duty of every delegate to put forward their area’s views, in this case a national ballot, forcefully and democratically. The Nottinghamshire delegates, Henry Richardson and Ray Chadburn, did their duty by the Nottinghamshire Miners by supporting the call for a ballot, which the majority of the Notts coalfield wanted. The vote of the NEC from Scotland to Kent voted to endorse Rule 41 and therefore no national ballot would be held. Richardson and Chadburn had done right by their members. They now, having lost the vote, had a duty to get behind the strike under Rule 41 which, in all fairness, they did. This vote by the democratically elected NEC legitimised the strike under NUM rules. The Nottinghamshire rank and file, with the exception of about 3,000 who went out on strike and stayed out for the duration, worked on despite this democratic decision by the NEC. North Derbyshire, another area which favoured a ballot but lost out democratically at the NEC at rank-and-file level took the national union to court because they had held a ballot in their area and voted against a strike and because the NUM had not had a national ballot, Rule 41 which had majority support nullified both arguments. The court of Lord Justice Nichols, not unexpectedly, ruled the strike was “illegal” because a ballot had not been held. This decision was, of course, bollocks because the NEC had legitimised the strike under NUM rules. It is at times such as these that a trade union has to say; fuck the law, we write the union rule book not the government or their courts. Once the day comes when a trade union allows the employer, in this case the British Government, to write their rule book then that is the day they should shut up shop. In the words of the late Sam McCluskey (National Union of Seamen, now part of the RMT):

I am sick to death of hearing about the law, the law is there to crush us, therefore times arise when such laws must be ignored.

The question of a national ballot due to press and media in general misinformation still goes on to this day. It was, and is, a fair question which deserves a fair answer which is given above, a democratic debate took place and a ballot voted down - it’s as simple as that. Even if Arthur Scargill had wanted to hold a ballot, he was powerless to call one as the governing body were the elected delegates of the NEC who voted for Rule 41. This decision to not hold a national strike ballot came as a surprise to the NUM leadership who, had it gone the other way in favour of a ballot, were prepared and had the machinery in motion for such an eventuality. Nothing dictatorial about it, as Mrs Thatcher claimed backed up by the liars in the press and on the news. No sinister terrorist tactics by the NUM, no cloak and dagger strategy just a plain old-fashioned vote. In fact the only dictator involved with the 1984/85 Miners Strike was Thatcher and her fascist styled police! Unlike Thatcher the NUM were a democratic union and abided by its rules as written by the union. Mrs Thatcher moved the goalposts when things did not go her way and the Miner’s Strike of 1984/85 for those of us around in those days showed the lengths the British state, particularly with a dictatorial Prime Minister like Thatcher, would go to crush working-class resistance. In this case opposition to pit closures and the destruction of jobs and communities. The leadership of the parliamentary Labour Party at the time, headed by Neil Kinnock showed at best tepid support for the NUM. There were exceptions like Tony Benn, Denis Skinner, Eric Heffer and Stan Orme but the shadow cabinet in general left a lot to be desired.

Next week I hope to look at the situation in Nottinghamshire during the strike and the alleged use of infiltrators and MI5 in that area. The case of the NACODS ballot will be looked at.

For further reading about the 1984/85 Miners Strike read Striking Similarities by Kevin Morley published by the Book Guild 2017 and The Enemy Within by Seumas Milne published by Verso 1994.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

British Coal Miner’s Strike 40 Years On ♠ The Question Of A Ballot

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