ABSTRACT
This chapter is not intended to deal with the immediate causes of the 1984–5 miners’ strike. Rather, it is concerned with the political, economic and industrial relations background which, indirectly rather than directly, helped to determine the attitudes of the NCB, CEGB, NUM and others who were either involved face-to-face or were drawn, in spite of themselves, into the conflict. The account starts towards the end of 1977 where it was left at the end of Chapter 7.
