ABSTRACT

Joe Gormley served on the Ashton in Makerfield District Council in his native Lancashire, before being elected secretary of the Lancashire miners in 1961 and joining the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) National Executive two years later. The old piecework system had benefited miners in highly productive coalfields like Nottinghamshire and South Yorkshire, but worked to the disadvantage of those who mined difficult seams in South Wales and Scotland. The introduction of the Power Loading Agreement in phases from 1966 had a severe impact on the earnings of many miners. Up until then miners had stayed fairly near the top of the national earnings table. The miners agreed to let oil supplies through on condition that the plant only operated priority cases under the NUM permit scheme for coke deliveries to schools, hospitals and old people. Arthur Scargill made an impassioned appeal on television for miners to come quickly.