O/T The Gov, Not Fit for Fracking Purpose!!!

[Brin]

I once read that a fool is someone who is thick, but lacks the self-awareness to know that. I often think of that when I read your posts.

Wow...bet that took an age to think that up...

[KerrAvon]

Ok, let me make a few points;

Sacred cow, that's is plainly not the case, but the miner's strike was a massive undertaking by many Rotherham folk, and not many wern't affected by it, it quite obviously affected many, myself included, in terms of police brutality and corruption, and from a larger scale, a group of British workers being deliberatly targetted by the gov't.

You talk of the NUM leadership 'wanting' the strike, personally i think that's bull, alongside your assumption that the strike didn't have a mandate, it did, and was voted on nationally months prior to the strike, although i can understand where you're coming from with that, as i believe the union should've voted again, as i think we would have had a victory there. This 'ideological hatred' you talk about is an historic thing where if you're a socialist with socialist beliefs, then you're going to be oppsed vehemently to tory party policies, arent you? You show a lack of understanding of the NUM to be labelling it as such.

Economics a prime factor? i'd put that secondary to Thatcher's gov't's willingness to crush a powerful union to be honest, UK coal mines heavily subsidised? no more so than German, French, American, etc etc etc. Coal becoming less important by the 80's? i suppose that's why we're still importing millions of tonnes to keep your laptop running then eh?

Times do change without doubt, but a forward thinking progressive gov't would've and should've had a plan in place to handle that change in terms of how you go about planning that change, rather than dumping thousands of communities and millions of people onto the scrap heap, therefore creating the problems you see today in those same communities. I can't really believe you've compared the UK coal industry to Roof repair, i'll leave that right there.

The costs of union militancy? ah, yes, all raging communists as well who only wanted a revolution, i'll tell you what that "militancy" really was about shall i? That militancy was about getting safe working conditions for all, preventing accidents and actively forcing the pit management to employ safe working practices, militancy was also about looking after yourself and your workmates, and in a broader sense other workforces who were being victimised by management practices. You talk of economic vandalism, a great soundbite that, and that's all it is, and to say the NUM was concerned with only itself is utter bull, again, you now nothing of it, i will tell you this, that when the steelworkers were on strike, before the miners, you remember? that the NUM and it's "militancy" stopped the use of British Steel during the dispute in support of the steelworkers, but you wouldn't 'get' that kind of support would you.

My final words on the subject, is this, and everyone who slags off the miner's strike and the reasons for it should read and take this in;

For a whole year, hundreds of thousands of men withdrew their labour, with no pay, no benefits, A WHOLE YEAR, men with families to feed and support. They didn't do this for pay rises, they didn't do this because one man told them to do this, or because an organisation told them to do this, they did this because they had the foresight to see what the gov't was doing, and what effect that would have on them, on their communities, on the country, you see all around you to this day the consequences of the miners losing that battle, but keep believing it was all Scargills fault, you're wrong, massively wrong Kerr.

The strike is quite clearly a sacred cow subject on here. The reaction of people like Brin amply demonstrates that.

You are incorrect when you assert that there had been a national ballot some months previously. National strike ballots had been held in January 1982, October 1982 and February 1983 and had been defeated on each occasion. At a meeting to discuss proposals for a national ballot on 12th April 1984, that proposal was rejected by the NUM National Executive, with some of those who had spoken in favour of a ballot being attacked as they left the meeting:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/d...00/2843003.stm

That the strike had been called in breach of UK employment law and the NUM’s own constitution was established time and time again in court, notably in Taylor v NUM and Foulstone v NUM (Yorkshire Area). In that latter case, the NUM unsuccessfully argued that a ballot held in Yorkshire in 1981 met the requirements of the NUM constitution. Those were both cases in which working people had to take their own union to court to assert their rights under the union’s constitution.

The Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Areas both voted against strike action in area ballots. In other words, working people exercised their democratic rights enshrined in the constitution of the union which their subs funded. Of course, the NUM leadership rode roughshod over that and let loose the flying pickets.

I’m not here to defend police violence, but I don’t think supporters of the strike can take any moral advantage from its existence. Picketing miners regularly resorted to intimidation, up to and including violence, to seek to assert their will over other working people who had made a different decision to them. It is said that up to 7000 pickets turned up at Orgreave on occasion. That wasn’t an attempt at peaceful picketing and persuasion. There were people there on boths sides looking for a rumble and a rumble is what is happened.

It’s strange that when supports of the strike complain about the violence meted out in it towards them, they never acknowledge that which came from their ‘side’. They certainly never mention David Wilkie a working man killed for doing his job:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/d...00/2512469.stm

I think ideological hatred an apt description. I’m surprised that you don’t too given your concession that it was ‘an historic thing where if you're a socialist with socialist beliefs, then you're going to be opposed vehemently to tory party policies. Is there a better definition of ideological hatred? It certainly fills the bill as far as I’m concerned.

Yes, we still import coal and the constant failure of the UK coal industry to compete with those imports rather makes the point that coal mining in this country had become uneconomic.

I agree that there needed to be planning for the demise of the UK coal industry, but you underestimate the power of government, particularly when it comes to job creation. In addition, I think that, once again, supporters of the strike can take little moral advantage from any failure of government on that score. It was the repeatedly stated aim of the NUM that there should be no closure of mines on economic grounds. It follows that when the government decided to do just, the primary thrust of their planning was always going to be how to defeat the inevitable strike and avoid the attempt by the NUM to wreak economic damage in support of its aim. You don’t like the tag economic vandalism. I think it accurate. Witness one of the guidelines issued by the NUM to areas during the strike:

There shall be no movement of coal or coal products into or out of the country nor internally within the country unless by prior agreement with the [Union] . In other words, as well as trying to dictate to working people, the NUM was also seeking to dictate to the country.

As I have said before, had the NUM taken a different path and spoken with the government rather than trying it to bring it down, then perhaps there could have been a softer landing for the industry and more focus upon the aftermath of closures. Instead, it chose an outright, ideologically driven, last-man-standing fight and lost, thus giving up any possibility of influencing what followed.

The TU movement has achieved many great things for working people in terms of better pay and conditions and safer working practices, but the NUM of the 1980s bore no resemblance to that movement at its best. It had become an organisation that was willing to ride roughshod over the law, its own constitution and, most importantly any of its own members who disagreed with the diktats of the National Executive. It had become an organisation that thought it had the right to disregard the choices that ordinary working people made and to, at the very least, turn a blind eye to the intimidation and violence meted out to those who chose to work. I think Thatcher was wrong to brand miners as ‘the enemy within’, but it’s a title that seems to fit for the NUM

[KerrAvon]

Pulling the drawbridge up and stuffing the generations to come is the only Tory show in town .

Social housing was another one of their gems , the youngsters today are paying that price and are at the mercy of slum landlords .

Stuffing the generations to come? That's a bit rich coming from a supporter of Corbyn - a man whose sole economic policy seems to be borrow, borrow, borrow and let future generations pick up the tab.

As for social housing, which is more than a bit off-topic, is your ambition for the working man that he should always live in rented accommodation to which he has no right to buy? A nineteenth century Tory would have been proud of you.

[zouch]

OK Thanks everyone for the wide range of views and its nice to read these debates without insults and dis-respecting a different point of view.

The original post quite rightly questioned fracking. The point i wish to make is that;
Fracking cannot be the answer to the energy security conundrum.
It is unlikely that is causes the same kind of environmental damage that evidence suggest happens in the USA. So on environmental grounds the arguments are week, however the moral position is a different.
Renewable energy is clearly the answer, however, without energy storage we aren't there yet,

What saddens me is the shot term arguments being used to promote or deny any particular choice.
We simply to have to ween ourselves off energy sources which create Co2 and carbon. The effects of any carbon production is catastrophic for mankind! We have to search for technology solutions that can get round the deficiencies of renewable energy production. So, if we put our resources into this then our reliance on fracking (water course disruption, and carbon) coal (negative carbon and health impacts) nuclear (its not safe) will be at best a short term fix to our very wasteful energy use, ill come back to this point.

Renewable energy is now being produced at a cost similar to fracking so the economic arguments no longer stack up but this argument is still being used by government as a reason to invest in outdated carbon intensive energy production. Governments addiction to energy creates the same behaviours as a individuals addiction to heroin) Hence the dash for fracking. There is no long term solution being sought instead there is the short term fix of fracking and nuclear. A serious failing of successive governments, and our obligations to Paris agreements have no chance of being met unless there is a longer term plan.

Amanda - you asked what you can do. Im not sure on what question you are asking but we all have the potential to use less energy and make more efficient energy choices (this is not about abstaining from doing anything that you currently do - its about doing it more efficiently. EG traveling to see RUFC in Norwich can be done using less energy using public transport or with a full car. ( I have written to RUFCs commercial team on how to run a more responsible commercial agenda without compromise to any of its commercial objectives I got no reply! (bearing in mind that business creates 80% of all carbon. We need businesses to make more responsible choices and in doing so they will save money and can earn new profit sources. EG easier access to transport will mean more tickets sold.

One last point - i have never been down a mine or suffered as a result of the demise of the mining industry - but energy solutions go hand in hand with social impacts. after all whats the point in being energy conscious - or cost effective when our own well being is reduced.

[Amanda_Hugg_n_Kiss]

'tree hugger' 'loony lefty' 'terrorist sympathizer' 'conspiracy theorist' and many more.

[millmoormagic]

Stuffing the generations to come? That's a bit rich coming from a supporter of Corbyn - a man whose sole economic policy seems to be borrow, borrow, borrow and let future generations pick up the tab.

As for social housing, which is more than a bit off-topic, is your ambition for the working man that he should always live in rented accommodation to which he has no right to buy? A nineteenth century Tory would have been proud of you.

Corbyn's sole economic policy is to borrow? i think you should take a look at how much the current shower have borrowed, the supposed party of sound economics, don't make me laugh, they screwed everyone over with no benefit for anyone, or the country, apart from their friends only interested in profiteering and treating people like shyte.

[KerrAvon]

Renewable energy is clearly the answer, however, without energy storage we aren't there yet.

Well at least you recognise the problem with renewables. Solar produces a reasonable amount of energy on long summer days - when energy demand is at its lowest. Wind only produces energy when its windy (and not too windy). In other words, renewables are fine until you get a series of dull still days in the middle of winter, at which point we are either going to have to get the candles out or have a bank of fossil fuel using powers stations ticking over at great expense whilst waiting to be booted up.

Nobody has come up with any viable proposal for energy storage on the scale that would be required to make renewables a realistic option as the main source of energy generation. And just how much storage capacity would there have to be to deal with the renewable nightmare - a high pressure sitting over the UK in December bringing freezing fog and lack of wind for several days.

[KerrAvon]

Corbyn's sole economic policy is to borrow? i think you should take a look at how much the current shower have borrowed, the supposed party of sound economics, don't make me laugh, they screwed everyone over with no benefit for anyone, or the country, apart from their friends only interested in profiteering and treating people like shyte.

Are you saying that Corbyn has another economic policy? Is he going to plant money trees? The Tories have borrowed plenty, but far more than the Left wanted.

[millmoormagic]

The strike is quite clearly a sacred cow subject on here. The reaction of people like Brin amply demonstrates that.

You are incorrect when you assert that there had been a national ballot some months previously. National strike ballots had been held in January 1982, October 1982 and February 1983 and had been defeated on each occasion. At a meeting to discuss proposals for a national ballot on 12th April 1984, that proposal was rejected by the NUM National Executive, with some of those who had spoken in favour of a ballot being attacked as they left the meeting:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/d...00/2843003.stm

That the strike had been called in breach of UK employment law and the NUM’s own constitution was established time and time again in court, notably in Taylor v NUM and Foulstone v NUM (Yorkshire Area). In that latter case, the NUM unsuccessfully argued that a ballot held in Yorkshire in 1981 met the requirements of the NUM constitution. Those were both cases in which working people had to take their own union to court to assert their rights under the union’s constitution.

The Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Areas both voted against strike action in area ballots. In other words, working people exercised their democratic rights enshrined in the constitution of the union which their subs funded. Of course, the NUM leadership rode roughshod over that and let loose the flying pickets.

I’m not here to defend police violence, but I don’t think supporters of the strike can take any moral advantage from its existence. Picketing miners regularly resorted to intimidation, up to and including violence, to seek to assert their will over other working people who had made a different decision to them. It is said that up to 7000 pickets turned up at Orgreave on occasion. That wasn’t an attempt at peaceful picketing and persuasion. There were people there on boths sides looking for a rumble and a rumble is what is happened.

It’s strange that when supports of the strike complain about the violence meted out in it towards them, they never acknowledge that which came from their ‘side’. They certainly never mention David Wilkie a working man killed for doing his job:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/d...00/2512469.stm

I think ideological hatred an apt description. I’m surprised that you don’t too given your concession that it was ‘an historic thing where if you're a socialist with socialist beliefs, then you're going to be opposed vehemently to tory party policies. Is there a better definition of ideological hatred? It certainly fills the bill as far as I’m concerned.

Yes, we still import coal and the constant failure of the UK coal industry to compete with those imports rather makes the point that coal mining in this country had become uneconomic.

I agree that there needed to be planning for the demise of the UK coal industry, but you underestimate the power of government, particularly when it comes to job creation. In addition, I think that, once again, supporters of the strike can take little moral advantage from any failure of government on that score. It was the repeatedly stated aim of the NUM that there should be no closure of mines on economic grounds. It follows that when the government decided to do just, the primary thrust of their planning was always going to be how to defeat the inevitable strike and avoid the attempt by the NUM to wreak economic damage in support of its aim. You don’t like the tag economic vandalism. I think it accurate. Witness one of the guidelines issued by the NUM to areas during the strike:

There shall be no movement of coal or coal products into or out of the country nor internally within the country unless by prior agreement with the [Union] . In other words, as well as trying to dictate to working people, the NUM was also seeking to dictate to the country.

As I have said before, had the NUM taken a different path and spoken with the government rather than trying it to bring it down, then perhaps there could have been a softer landing for the industry and more focus upon the aftermath of closures. Instead, it chose an outright, ideologically driven, last-man-standing fight and lost, thus giving up any possibility of influencing what followed.

The TU movement has achieved many great things for working people in terms of better pay and conditions and safer working practices, but the NUM of the 1980s bore no resemblance to that movement at its best. It had become an organisation that was willing to ride roughshod over the law, its own constitution and, most importantly any of its own members who disagreed with the diktats of the National Executive. It had become an organisation that thought it had the right to disregard the choices that ordinary working people made and to, at the very least, turn a blind eye to the intimidation and violence meted out to those who chose to work. I think Thatcher was wrong to brand miners as ‘the enemy within’, but it’s a title that seems to fit for the NUM

You say Tomato....talking about ballots, you know you're being a little pedantic, in all those ballots the majority voted in favour of strike action, although that majority not being enough to trigger the action, so to use the word "defeated" is incorrect.

Onto picket violence and "letting loose flying pickets" you keep referring back to the mainstream media's views on the strike, i actually though better of you to be honest, you know nothing, nothing of what went off during those days, i won't let someone like you label me or anyone else who took part the way you do, inferring that pickets were all violent thugs, which is far from the actual case. I will tell you this, i was a flying picket and countless times, countless times we got through to pits to picket where there would be just a couple of policemen on duty, we could have easily taken control of that and done as we chose fit, but didn't, invariably the police reinforced and then, and only then, did any kind of violence happen, because the police had the upper hand and excercised that fact and used it to beat people up. Don't preach to people who know the real truth of it.

You talk about UK constant failure to compete with foreign coal, ive touched on this previously, but the costs associated with UK coal were by and large driven by the safe systems of work employed, obviously gained through having a strong union, the cheap coal imports on the other hand, no safety, death after death after death, if you're happy with that, great.

Try, just try to see things from the union's side, the union was in constant dialogue with the gov't prior to the strike, about pit closures etc and indeed there were closures, your talk of the NUM taking a different path is bull and you know it, not until the gov't had stockpiled enough coal did they then instigate the strike by announcing the pit closures on top of any which had been agreed on, gov't policy started the strike, and yeh, the miners lost, but so did the country.

[KerrAvon]

It doesn’t matter what I call a tomato. It’s what you and I call a national ballot that is in issue. Can you confirm that you are abandoning your claim that there was one months before the strike?

I think your memory is playing further tricks with you. The Nottinghamshire miners voted more than three to one against striking (the local NUM leadership had pleaded with Yorkshire to keep flying pickets out of the county until after the vote. Perhaps inevitably, the Yorkshire NUM ignored that and, anecdotally, it is said that their conduct played a major part in the outcome of the ballot). Derbyshire voted 50.1% against striking.

So you took part in secondary picketing (and in doing so broke the law passed by a democratically elected government and terms of the injunction taken against the NUM). Why did you do that? If working miners wanted to work and, in the absence of the national ballot that the NUM constitution said they were entitled to, their areas had voted not to join the strike, why not respect their decisions?

Are you saying that secondary pickets never took part in intimidation, that working miners never suffered violence and damage to property, that, 30 years after the event, Rotherham supporters don’t spend most of the game chanting ‘scabs’ when playing a Notts team? And what about the 7000 who turned up at Orgreave? What do you say was the plan? To have a picnic and sing kumbayah?

And what about the killing of David Wilkie who you shamefully and oh so inevitably ignore? Did the police make Hancock and Shankland drop a concrete block onto his car as it passed below them? Or do you buy in to their claim that it was an accident? I mean, it happens all the time doesn’t it? Standing on a bridge with a lump of concrete that it takes two men to hold and then accidentally dropping it on car in which a working man is on his way to work.

Yes, the miners happily worked overtime to stockpile coal at pit heads and power stations as the government prepared for the strike. As I explained, the NUM had said that it would not accept the closure of mines on economic grounds and so the government prepared for the inevitable strike that would follow its decision to begin closures upon that ground. What are you saying? That it was 'unfair' of them to prepare for what was coming? The government went into the conflict with a cool head, whilst the NUM leadership went into it ignoring the requirements of its own constitution and swinging wildly at anyone who tried to stop it.