ABSTRACT
A remarkable thing has happened in Britain’s coalfields. Despite the well-publicised dismantling of the coal industry, which by the mid 1990s had reduced its employment by nine-tenths in a decade, registered unemployment in the coalfield areas has not risen. Indeed the official unemployment figures suggest that coalfield unemployment in the mid 1990s is lower than a decade ago, and that the gap between the coalfields and the rest of the country has narrowed.
