It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
A Saudi official said Thursday that the 22-nation Arab Group would reject any UN climate deal that goes after fossil fuels at the COP29 talks in Azerbaijan.
The negotiations in Baku have centred on reaching a climate finance deal to help developing nations tackle global warming, but countries have also clashed over a push to renew a pledge to transition away from fossil fuels.
"The Arab Group will not accept any text that targets any specific sectors, including fossil fuel," Albara Tawfiq, a Saudi official speaking on behalf of the bloc, told delegates in Baku.
Last year's COP28 in Dubai produced a landmark agreement on "transitioning away from fossil fuels" following opposition from Saudi Arabia and the OPEC group of oil producers.
"We all know that there has been a backsliding. There has been an attempt to interpret what we agreed last year as a menu," Irish climate minister Eamon Ryan told reporters.
22 Arab countries at COP29 have rejected the targeting of fossil fuels [Getty]
"That has to stop in the interests of the Arab group, too," he said.
Developed nations and countries vulnerable to climate impacts have pushed for the Dubai commitment to be reaffirmed at COP29.
"It is an embarrassment to all of us if we back away as climate impacts worsen all over the world," Tina Stege, climate envoy of the Marshall Islands, told delegates.
"We need to transition away from fossil fuels," she said.
'Moment of truth' for world-first plastic pollution treaty
by Sara Hussein with Isabel Malsang in Paris Nov 21, 2024 AFP
Plastic pollution litters our seas, our air and even our bodies, but negotiators face an uphill battle next week to agree on the world's first treaty aimed at ending the problem — Martin BERNETTI
Plastic pollution litters our seas, our air and even our bodies, but negotiators face an uphill battle next week to agree on the world's first treaty aimed at ending the problem.
Countries will have a week in South Korea's Busan from Monday to round off two years of negotiations.
They remain deeply divided on whether the deal should limit plastic production and certain chemicals, and even if the treaty should be adopted by majority vote or consensus.
The talks are a "moment of truth", UN Environment Programme chief Inger Andersen warned this month.
"Busan can and must mark the end of the negotiations," she insisted, in a nod to growing speculation that the process could be extended.
She acknowledged that serious differences remain, urging "more convergence" on the most difficult areas.
"Everyone wants an end to plastic pollution," she said.
"Now it is up to member states to deliver."
There is little dispute about the scale of the problem.
In 2019, the world produced around 460 million tonnes of plastic, a figure that has doubled since 2000, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Plastic production is expected to triple by 2060.
- Fault-line - More than 90 percent of plastic is not recycled, with over 20 million tonnes leaking into the environment, often after just a few minutes of use.
Microplastics have been found in the deepest parts of the ocean, the world's highest mountain peaks and just about every part of the human body.
Plastic also accounts for around three percent of global emissions, mostly linked to its production from fossil fuels.
The main fault-line in talks is where to tackle the problem.
Some countries, including the so-called High Ambition Coalition (HAC) that groups many African, Asian and European nations, want to discuss the entire "lifecycle" of plastics.
That means limiting production, redesigning products for reuse and recycling, and addressing waste.
On the other side are countries, largely oil producers like Saudi Arabia and Russia, who want a downstream focus on waste alone.
The HAC wants binding global targets on reducing production and warned ahead of the Busan talks that "vested interests" should not be allowed to hamper a deal.
The divisions have stymied four previous rounds of talks, producing an unwieldy document of over 70 pages.
The diplomat chairing the talks has produced an alternative document intended to synthesise the views of delegations and move negotiations forward.
- 'Expectations are high' -
It is a more manageable 17 pages, and highlights areas of agreement, including the need to promote reusability.
However, it leaves the thorniest issues largely unaddressed.
A European diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, warned the document was "not ambitious enough" on a range of subjects.
The assessment from the Center for International Environmental Law was blunter: "The text would deliver an ineffective and useless treaty and it would fail to adequately address the plastic crisis."
Key to any agreement will be the United States and China, neither of which have openly sided with either bloc.
Earlier this year, Washington raised hopes among environmentalists by signalling support for some limits on production, a position that is reportedly now being rowed back.
The election of Donald Trump has also raised questions about how ambitious the US delegation will be, and whether negotiators should even bother seeking US support if a treaty is unlikely to be ratified by Washington.
Some plastic producers are pushing governments to focus on waste management and reusability, warning production caps would cause "unintended consequences".
But others back a deal with global standards, including on "sustainable" production levels.
"Expectations are high ahead of Busan," said Eirik Lindebjerg, global plastics policy lead at conservation group WWF.
An "overwhelming majority" of countries already back binding rules across the plastic lifecycle, he told AFP.
"It is now up to the leaders of those countries to deliver the treaty the world needs and not let a handful of unwilling countries or industry interests stop this."
South Korea’s mountain of plastic waste shows limits of recycling A mountain of about 19,000 tonnes of finely ground plastic waste is piled up untreated at a shuttered plastic recycling site in Asan, about 85 kilometers south of Seoul.
https://arab.news/cmdne Reuters November 22, 2024
South Korea says that it recycles 7% of its plastic waste, compared to about 5%-6% in the US
SEOUL: South Korea has won international praise for its recycling efforts, but as it prepares to host talks for a global plastic waste agreement, experts say the country’s approach highlights its limits.
When the talks known as INC-5 kick off in Busan next week, debate is expected to center around whether a UN treaty should seek to limit the amount of plastic being made in the first place.
South Korea says that it recycles 73 percent of its plastic waste, compared to about 5 percent-6 percent in the United States, and the country might seem to be a model for a waste management approach.
The bi-monthly MIT Technology Review magazine has rated South Korea as “one of the world’s best recycling economies,” and the only Asian country out of the top 10 on its Green Future Index in 2022.
But environmental activists and members of the waste management industry say the recycling numbers don’t tell the whole story.
South Korea’s claimed rate of 73 percent “is a false number, because it just counts plastic waste that arrived at the recycling screening facility — whether it is recycled, incinerated, or landfilled afterward, we don’t know,” said Seo Hee-won, a researcher at local activist group Climate Change Center.
Greenpeace estimates South Korea recycles only 27 percent of its total plastic waste. The environment ministry says the definition of waste, recycling methods and statistical calculation vary from country to country, making it difficult to evaluate uniformly.
South Korea’s plastic waste generation increased from 9.6 million tons in 2019 to 12.6 million tons in 2022, a 31 percent jump in three years partly due to increased plastic packaging of food, gifts and other online orders that mushroomed during the pandemic, activists said. Data for 2023 has not been released.
A significant amount of that plastic is not being recycled, according to industry and government sources and activists, sometimes for financial reasons.
At a shuttered plastic recycling site in Asan, about 85km south of Seoul, a mountain of about 19,000 tonnes of finely ground plastic waste is piled up untreated, emitting a slightly noxious smell. Local officials said the owner had run into money problems, but could not provide details.
“It will probably take more than 2-3 billion won ($1.43 million-$2.14 million) to remove,” said an Asan regional government official. “The owner is believed unable to pay, so the cleanup is low priority for us.”
Reuters has reported that more than 90 percent of plastic waste gets dumped or incinerated because there is no cheap way to repurpose it, according to a 2017 study.
NO CONCRETE GOALS
South Korean government’s regulations on single-use plastic products have also been criticized for being inconsistent. In November 2023, the environment ministry eased restrictions on single-use plastic including straws and bags, rolling back rules it had strengthened just a year earlier.
“South Korea lacks concrete goals toward reducing plastic use outright, and reusing plastic,” said Hong Su-yeol, director of Resource Circulation Society and Economy Institute and an expert on the country’s waste management.
Nara Kim, a Seoul-based campaigner for plastic use reduction at Greenpeace, said South Korea’s culture of valuing elaborate packaging of gifts and other items needs to change, while other activists pointed to the influence of the country’s petrochemical producers.
“Companies are the ones that pay the money, the taxes,” said a recycling industry official who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue, adding that this enabled them to wield influence. “The environment ministry is the weakest ministry in the government.”
The environment ministry said South Korea manages waste over the entire cycle from generation to recycling and final disposal.
The government has made some moves to encourage Korea Inc. to recycle, including its petrochemical industry that ranks fifth in global market share.
President Yoon Suk Yeol said at the G-20 summit on Tuesday that “efforts to reduce plastic pollution must also be made” for sustainable development, and that his government will support next week’s talks.
The government has changed regulations to allow companies like leading petrochemical producer LG Chem to generate naphtha, its primary feedstock, by recycling plastic via pyrolysis. SK Chemicals’ depolymerization chemical recycling output has already been used in products such as water bottles as well as tires for high-end EVs.
Pyrolysis involves heating waste plastic to extremely high temperatures causing it to break down into molecules that can be repurposed as a fuel or to create second-life plastic products. But the process is costly, and there is also criticism that it increases carbon emissions.
“Companies have to be behind this,” said Jorg Weberndorfer, Minister Counsellor at the trade section of the EU Delegation to South Korea.
“You need companies who really believe in this and want to have this change. I think there should be an alliance between public authorities and companies.”
The Shift: Dems throw Palestinian activists under the bus in election postmortems
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but a number of pundits are attempting to blame the left for Kamala Harris’s loss.
In this narrative, it’s not the highly-paid Democratic consultants or the donor class who helped deliver another four years of Trump. No, the blame should be pinned on activists and progressive groups.
According to Jentleson one of Harris’s big problems was the fact she backed handful of progressive positions five years ago.
“To cite a few examples, when Kamala Harris was running for the Democratic nomination in 2019, the A.C.L.U. pushed her to articulate a position on surgeries for transgender prisoners, needlessly elevating an obscure issue into the public debate as a purity test, despite the fact that current law already gave prisoners access to gender-affirming care,” writes Jentleson. “This became a major line of attack for Mr. Trump in the closing weeks of this year’s election. Now, with the G.O.P.’s ascent to dominance, transgender Americans are unquestionably going to be worse off.”
“The same year, a coalition of groups including the Sunrise Movement and the Working Families Party demanded that all Democrats running for president embrace decriminalizing border crossings,” he continues. “When candidates were asked at a debate if they would do so, every candidate on the stage that night raised a hand (except Michael Bennet). Groups like Justice Democrats pushed Democrats to defund the police and abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Positions taken a few years ago are fair game in campaigns, and by feeding into Republican attacks these efforts helped Mr. Trump and left the people and causes they claim to fight for under threat.”
His conclusion is straightforward: Democrats need to reject calls for progressive reforms and champion “heterodox” politics in order to win the 2026 midterms. In other words, they have to throw vulnerable populations under the bus and abandon any kind of commitment to combatting climate change.
There’s a lot missing from Jentleson’s analysis, but let’s start here: the progressive stances endorsed by Democratic candidates during the 2020 primaries did not materialize out of thin air.
The first Trump presidency was greeted by immediate protest and vast organizing, which led to some of his most draconian policy plans being blocked. We went on to watch the government botch the public health response to COVID and leave workers hung out to dry. People flooded the streets and demanded change after watching George Floyd get murdered by a police officer on camera. By some metrics, they were the most attended protests in the history of the United States and the actions led to a wider national conversation about race, history, and policing. We also saw millions of young people enthusiastically support the presidential campaign of Bernie Sanders, who ran on the Green New Deal, Medicare for All, and higher taxes on the rich.
The fact that Democrats publicly endorsed some of these positions is a testament to the hard work of activists who helped shift the public discussion through organizing. This is one of the ways that progress has historically worked in the United States. Jentleson’s assertion that this ended up being a big problem because there was Republican backlash could be used to throw water on virtually every social movement ever. That’s how it always works. In his book The Reactionary Mind political scientist Corey Robin writes that conservatism is a meditation on the felt experience of having power, seeing it threatened, and trying to win it back.
Jentleson neglects to point out that Harris openly abandoned all the progressive positions she embraced while running to be the 2020 nominee during her 2024 presidential campaign, but maybe that goes without saying. Perhaps it also goes without saying that Harris’s presidential campaign was partially geared to win over Republicans, by touting an endorsement from Dick Cheney, promising a tough border policy, and failing to articulate any kind of robust plan for the working class. Maybe it doesn’t have to be pointed out that Harris vowed to continue weapon sales to Israel, despite continuous left-wing pressure calling on her to change course.
However, I think Jentleson should remind readers that Harris was one of the first Democratic candidates to withdraw from the 2020 primary. In fact, she quit the race in 2019.
This certainly wasn’t because Harris was “too woke.” In fact, it’s pretty easy to make the opposite argument. A former prosecutor who presided over a truancy crackdown simply didn’t have a lot of appeal at a time when many people were already reading books like The New Jim Crow and talking about decarceration, partially because of Ferguson, Baltimore, and a number of other recent uprisings. Within six months over half the population believed burning down the Minneapolis police precinct was justified.
But let’s leave all that aside and talk about the elephant in the room. How does someone write a piece about groups having too much influence on the Democratic party and not mention pro-Israel lobbying organizations? AIPAC spent over $100 million on the last election cycle and ousted multiple progressives with massive help from GOP donors. I’m going to go out on a limb and say they are a more relevant target when we’re assessing what’s wrong with the Democrats.
The real punchline of this Op-Ed is revealed in the author bio section at the end. Jentleson is the former chief of staff to Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman, a guy who has spent the past year enthusiastically celebrating the genocide in Gaza. He’s even positioned himself to the right of the Biden administration on the issue, criticizing the White House for briefly threatening to condition military aid. Last week Fetterman attacked The Pope for calling for an investigation into Israel’s genocide.
When he originally ran for Senate Senate Fetterman was insufficiently anti-Palestinian by the standards of lobbying groups, so he allowed Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI) to write his position paper on the issue.
Fetterman beat TV personality and snake oil salesman Dr. Oz in that election. Now Trump has nominated Oz to oversee Medicare and Medicaid.
“If Dr. Oz is about protecting and preserving Medicare and Medicaid, I’m voting for the dude,” tweeted Fetterman.
When Will Democrats Learn to Say Yes, indeed. Bernie Resolutions
This week the Senate rejected a series of resolutions that would have blocked some arms sales to Israel.
The Joint Resolutions of Disapproval (JRDs) were introduced by Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders last month and applied to tank ammunition, fighter jets, and other weapons.
The first resolution, on tank ammunition, was rejected by a vote of 18-79. Here’s the Democrats that voted for it:
Dick Durbin (D-IL), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Angus King (I-ME), Ben Ray Lujan (D-NM), Ed Markey (D-MA), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Chris Murphy (D-CT), Jon Ossoff (D-GA), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Brian Schatz (D-HI), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Tina Smith (D-MN), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Raphael Warnock (D-GA), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Peter Welch (D-VT).
Sen. George Helmy (D-NJ) joined his 18 colleagues in voting for the resolutions on military equipment and mortar rounds. It’s unclear why someone would support sending Israel more tank ammunition, but draw the line at other kinds of ammunition, but I digress.
There was no chance of this thing passing. It was never going to clear the Senate and even it had by some miracle, it would have still had to make it through the House and ultimately be signed by the president. We know Biden and Trump do not want to condition military weapons to Israel.
Having said all that, this was an historic moment as it was the first time the Senate had ever voted on the issue.
I have few takeaways:
1.) Despite the fact this wasn’t going to pass, we saw a full-court press from pro-Israel lawmakers and groups to limit the amount of Senators who endorsed it.
The White House circulated talking points on Capitol Hill, Chuck Schumer worked to whip votes, and AIPAC lobbied its supporters on the issue. I believe this speaks to a deep concern about Israel’s diminishing reputation. An impressive vote would simply the latest example that ironclad support for Israel is starting to crack.
2.) I was surprised to see Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey vote for the resolutions, as he’s been a staunch supporter of Israel for his entire political career. I believe it’s important to look at the increasing local pressure he’s faced on the issue.
In 2022 I wrote an article about activists targeting Markey over his stance. “Liberation politics are not a buffet, but an ethos,” one of them told me. “Senator Markey has made it clear that the ‘progressivism’ he claims to support – rights to healthcare, ending racial violence, and economic freedom – shouldn’t extend to Palestinians under occupation. That is racist, and progressives in Massachusetts should see it for what it is.”
3.) Tammy Baldwin just narrowly won her election, but voted “present.” It will be interesting to see what kind of pressure she’ll face from the left in Wisconsin.
4.) We constantly hear about how lawmakers have to unequivocally support Israel in order to stay in power, so how do we explain the fact that Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff felt compelled to back the resolutions? They represent a 50/50 state that just flipped back to red in the presidential election and are probably two of the more vulnerable members of their caucus.
“Let me say, unequivocally, that in defending our policies, jobs, communities and industry, we had no alternative – and history will vindicate our action.”
Arthur Scargill, NUM General Secretary during the Miners’ Strike
Published is the text of the speech made by Arthur Scargill, the then General Secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers, to the 1985 NUM Conference.
Conference meets this year following the longest, most bitter and possibly most savage national strike ever seen anywhere in the world. We meet not in the aftermath but still in the midst of a historic and heroic struggle waged by this Union and mining communities against the most reactionary coal industry management seen since the 1920s and 30s a struggle in which we have had to face the combined weight of the most reactionary and destructive Government Britain has known in over a century.
We have come through a strike which has changed the course of British history: a conflict of tremendous significance which has resounded around the world – a conflict which has transformed the lives of those who stood and fought against the National Coal Board’s disastrous pit closure programme -a conflict which has inspired workers in this and other countries to defend the right to work.
The National Union of Mineworkers has challenged the very heart of the capitalist system. We have refused to accept that any industry in capitalist society – whether public or private – has the right to destroy the livelihood of men and women at the stroke of an accountant’s pen. Our challenge has been met by an Establishment reaction of unprecedented savagery.
The pit closure programme announced by the Board on the 6th March, 1984 was a deliberate action, designed to provoke our Union into either taking strike action or backing down in the face of Coal Board`s policy.
Since November, 1983, the Union had been operating a highly successful overtime ban, building an effective “Campaign For Coal”, winning support both in mining areas and in the wider community the NUM was taking the arguments for saving pits and jobs to our members and their families in a way which had never been seen before.
Faced with this unity of action, the Coal Board began a new tactic, using closure announcements to cut across and violate all our industry’s established procedures. As they contemptuously announced 25 pit closures – five of them to come immediately – with a loss of over 25,000 jobs, we knew that our Union had no real choice. We could either accept the Board’s proposals in the certain knowledge that they were only the start of a massive closure programme-or we could take strike action, and fight with dignity and pride for the position we knew to be right.
To the eternal credit of our Union, we took strike action. Let me say, unequivocally, that in defending our policies, jobs, communities and industry, we had no alternative – and history will vindicate our action.
Now, four months after our return to work, it is essential too look back over the first crucial phase of our fight for the future, examine what was accomplished, and determine where our Union and its members go from here.
It is vital that the Union analyses all the events of 1984/85 in order to learn from what took place and to utilise our experience in the next stage of our fight. The Board’s pit closure programme for 1984/85 was not carried through because the miners took strike action! It was the determination of this Union and mining communities which delivered the worst blow ever dealt to the Thatcher Government, and created a crisis in international capital.
The cost of the miners’ strike in Thatcherism has been truly astronomic. In their crusade against the NUM and trade unionism, the Government robbed Britain’s taxpayers of £8 billion (more than eight times the cost of the Falklands War), as they desperately sought to defeat the miners and destroy the National Union of Mineworkers.
History will record that this was a colossal act of vandalism by a monetarist Tory Government, which in order to survive requires a high pool of unemployed – a weak, collaborationist, or non-existent trade union movement – and laws which remove the democratic rights won by our people in over two centuries of struggle.
The attack on our Union was the culmination of five years in which the Thatcher Government had successively introduced anti-trade union legislation while raising unemployment to four-and-a-half million – and through the use of the media had implanted in trade unionists’ minds the idea that they could not win any struggle against this new authoritarian Government.
The decision to appoint Ian MacGregor as Chairman of the National Coal Board was evidence of the Tories’ growing confidence-and, with their success against the NGA, and the elimination of trade unionism at G.C.H.Q, they showed their increasing contempt for the T.U.C. and its affiliated unions.
Ian MacGregor was appointed NCB Chairman in order that free market criteria could be applied to the mining industry, following exactly the line pursued by the Tory Government in other nationalised industries. His brief was to carry through a policy of pit closures as the first step towards a restructured coal industry, ripe for privatisation -a strategy which the Tories also believed would see Britain’s most powerful union rendered impotent.
Trade unionism and nationalisation are totally abhorrent to MacGregor. His union-busting record in the United States speaks for itself, and it was because of that record that he was brought over to Britain (to the eternal shame of the last Labour Government), first to British Leyland and then to British Steel, before being instructed to butcher British coal.
His attitude not only towards trade unions but Parliament itself has been demonstrated within the last fortnight-first by his disdainful dismissal of the Conservative-dominated Employment Select Committee’s report, which recommended that the Coal Board review its position in relation to those miners dismissed during the strike – a recommendation which if implemented would result in over 80 per cent of those sacked being reinstated.
During the strike, over 900 miners were sacked, and since the end of the strike, still more have been dismissed. To date, over 600 have not been reinstated.
Over 50 of our members have been jailed while carrying out union policy, taking action to save pits and jobs. They are political prisoners, whose crime is fighting for the right to work, and an amnesty for them, as well as reinstatement for all who have been sacked, are among our first priorities.
Ian MacGregor’s contempt for our industry and those who work within it has also just been demonstrated by the Board’s total abandonment of the agreement reached last autumn with NACODS, modifying the Colliery Review Procedure. This Agreement, described during our strike as “sacrosanct” by both the Board and the Government, has now been proved the sham we always said it was.
Ironically, if we judge Ian MacGregor’s stewardship of the coal industry even on the basis of his own market forces criteria, he stands accused of total incompetence and of crimes against Britain’s economy and the British people. During the two years since his appointment, he has cost the taxpayers of this nation over £90 million per week. He is, by any standards, an unmitigated disaster, and if ever there was a case for redundancy, he represents the perfect candidate -the quicker he goes, the better for all concerned.
The NUM argued from the beginning that Ian MacGregor should never have been appointed, his entire performance during and since the end of the dispute bears witness to our belief. Under his direction, local and area management of the Board have embarked on a vendetta of draconian measures which have deliberately destroyed long-established customs and practice within our industry. We have seen industrial relations dismantled as Board management takes an increasingly hard line against our members.
There is no denying that the miners’ strike could have been brought to a swift and successful conclusion within a short space of time but for a number of important factors which had a major effect on the attitude of both the Coal Board and the Government.
1. Following our Special Delegate Conference on 19th April, 1984, which reaffirmed the democratic decision to endorse strike action in accordance with Rule 41, the Union’s call on all Areas to support the dispute was not followed by Nottinghamshire, South Derbyshire or Leicestershire.
In refusing to respond to a call from the vast majority of their colleagues already on strike, and – more importantly – by refusing to respect picket lines, those who continued to work producing coal provided a life-line to the Tory Government as it waged class war against the NUM.
2. There have been many comments from critics, cynics and even some colleagues, suggesting that had we held an individual ballot vote the outcome of our dispute would have been different. That argument has three basic flows:
(a) It fails to recognise that miners in 1984 were taking the same kind of action they had taken in 1981, when they had the support of Notts., South Derbyshire and Leicester -without a ballot.
(b) By the time of our Conference on the 19th April last year, nearly 80 per cent of our members were already on strike.
(c) The argument also fails to recognise, or conveniently forgets, that on a previous occasion Areas, including Notts., South Derbyshire and Leicester, refused to accept the democratic decision of our membership as determined in an individual ballot vote, and proceeded to negotiate with the Coal Board an incentive scheme which has helped to divide this Union and weaken our ability to fight for our policies.
3. There have been suggestions (again, from critics, cynics, even some colleagues) that traditional, picket-line militancy is dead. Nothing could be further from the truth, and accurate, historical analysis will prove that point beyond doubt. It was not a failure of mass picketing, but a failure to mass picket that represented a weakness in many sections of our Union, and other trade unions beside ourselves must learn the lessons of what took place in 1984/85.
The mass picketing of Orgreave, like Saltley in 1972, proved so effective that it led to the British Steel Corporation halting its operations on the 18th June, 1984. But – unlike Saltley, where picketing was stepped up and intensified following the first closure – at Orgreave picketing was scaled down following our success on 18th June.
I have consistently argued that the tactics which brought us victory at Saltley should have been employed at Orgreave, where with increased picketing we would inevitably have involved the trade union and Labour movement throughout the Sheffield and South Yorkshire area, and brought the flow of coke from Orgreave to a complete halt.
We are involved in a class war, and any attempt to deny that flies in the face of reality. Confronted by our enemy’s mobilisation, we are entitled, indeed obliged, to call upon our class for massive support. In any future industrial action by any Union – including ours -this must be done.
4. It is a fact that the NUM did not receive the level of support we needed and were entitled to expect from our colleagues in the wider Movements.
In spite of pleas from this Union, the leaders of the power workers refused to give us the same basic support they gave in 1974 – a measure of support which, I should add for the sake of the record, was not present in 1972 (contrary to any statements made by media experts). In 1974, by operating basic principled guidelines, power workers stopped the flow of coal into British power stations.
By acquiescing in the conversion of coal-fired power stations to oil, the power station workers made it possible for the Government and the C.E.G.B. to raise the amount of oil burn from 5 to 40 per cent. Power station workers could have prevented this simply by operating along the same principled lines followed in 1974.
5. The abject refusal by I.S.T.C. leaders to mobilise and coordinate the same degree of support for the NUM which we gave steel workers in 1980 not only betrayed every tenet of the “Triple Alliance”, but actually forced and provoked the battles of Orgreave, Ravenscraig and Llanwern.
The British Steel Corporation has admitted that without the cooperation of the steel unions they could not have kept going, and the Coal Board would thus have been put under intense pressure to negotiate with the NUM.
6. The Government’s massive transport operation, mounted a long the lines of the Ridley Plan, to convey coal, coke and iron ore to power stations and steel works only proved effective because the power and steel unions failed to respect picket lines and stop deliveries.
On the other hand, the fantastic support given to us by the National Union of Railwaymen, A.S.L.E.F., the National Union of Seamen, and sections of the T.G.W.U. was not only an inspiration, but a demonstration to the rest of the Movement and the world of what trade union solidarity is all about. Their support is something that our Union will never forget.
7. Last October, NACODS, having committed themselves to a united fight with the NUM on pit closures, suddenly capitulated to the Board during talks at the conciliation service ACAS, and accepted what everyone now knows was a deal that amounted to deception.
This NACODS/NCB Agreement, described as “sacrosanct” by both the Board and Government, was praised to the skies by pundits and politicians who criticised the NUM for refusing to accept it.
The Agreement – which we said was worthless -was supposed to introduce into the colliery review procedure an independent appeals body, acceptable to unions and management, which would review any dispute about the future of a colliery or unit after all other procedures had been exhausted.
Only four months after the end of the miners’ strike, the Coal Board has now openly violated this “sacrosanct” Agreement, and has announced instead that it will go ahead on its own, unilaterally appointing one inspector to hear any appeals. The NUM warned that the Agreement was a sham, and we have been proved absolutely correct.
8. The T.U.C.’s failure to translate into positive action the decisions taken at the 1984 T.U.C. Congress was seen by the Government as a green light to intensify its attacks on the NUM Had the guidelines supporting the NUM adopted by Congress been even partially implemented, the pressure upon the Coal Board and the Government would have been intense, and a negotiated settlement inevitable.
There can be no excuse for the T.U.C. General Council’s refusal to provide desperately needed financial assistance to this Union following sequestration and receivership. The appointment of a Receiver for a trade union is unprecedented, and is associated with the new Tory legislation – yet, eight months after receivership was imposed on the NUM, the £400,000 fund established by the T.U.C. at the 1982 Wembley Conference remains intact while we fight to survive.
9. During the strike, the Labour Party leadership allowed itself to be preoccupied with allegations of “violence”, scripted daily by the media-when they should have been attacking the Tory Government for its violence against our industry, and defending our members in the same way as Thatcher defended her riot squad in blue.
10. The High Court decision last autumn to fine the NUM, and then place an order of sequestration upon us failed to stop the Union functioning. Further legal moves then resulted in the High Court sacking the three NUM Trustees and appointing a Receiver, whose purpose was to bring our Union’s operations and administration to a standstill by hijacking our funds. As a result of his appointment, our funds have been depleted by £1 million which would be part of our assets today had the Union’s Trustees not been removed by the High Court.
11. Throughout the past year, and longer, the capitalist media has played a role which would have impressed even Goebbells. Press and broadcasting have smeared and lied about our Union, its leadership and its members. It’s no good just blaming proprietors and managing editors. Journalists-many of whom will say privately that they “support” the miners – have allowed themselves to be used to attack us every day at every turn, as we fight to protect and sustain our industry. But in hurling weapon after weapon at the NUM, our enemies have revealed more than their hatred of us – they have revealed their own fear. Their viciousness springs from the knowledge that the heart of their own-class ridden system is under attack.
12. The proposal for a return to work without an agreement was a fundamental mistake – and events have shown that this was not the best course of action to adopt.
However, let no-one talk to me about defeat or setbacks. Those who since the end of the strike have pontificated in a negative and destructive fashion fail utterly to understand the nature of what actually took place.
This Union must not turn inwards in an orgy of self-criticism. We should stand confident and proud of what we have achieved, proclaiming the positive aspects of the dispute, and the most important victory of all – the struggle itself.
Within our Union and our communities, the strike brought forth revolutionary changes. I never tire of paying tribute to our young miners, whose courage and determination throughout the months’ battle remain an inspiration to us all. Our union must continue to involve them and use their energy and skills to the full.
I also acknowledge, yet again, the magnificent force which has emerged to take its rightful place alongside the N.U.M. -the women’s support groups. No words of mine can pay adequate tribute to their historic contribution to our common struggle. I believe I speak on behalf of Michael McGahey and Peter Heathfield as well when I say that nothing gives me greater pride than my association with Women Against Pit Closures.
They have been our strongest and truest allies, and there is absolutely no doubt that their collective strength is crucial to the fight that still lies ahead of us.
The Future
For the NUM, the tasks ahead present the greatest challenge any trade union has ever faced. We must build from this Conference a united fight united on policies and on principles. We must intensify the fight to save pits, jobs and communities, knowing that in the present climate only industrial action hopefully involving other mining unions can stop a pit closure programme which if allowed to proceed would slaughter our industry.
We must demand from the rest of the Movement – in particular the leadership of the Labour Party and the TUC -a commitment in action to our fight for coal.
The case to protect our communities and mining families is irrefutable – but never forget that it is inextricable from the economic case for coal, and it is on our economic case against pit closures that we urge the Labour Party and TUC to campaign in Parliament and throughout the nation.
The brilliant economic case against pit closures produced by Andrew Glyn of Oxford University shows that the cost to Britain’s taxpayers of closing a pit is almost double that of keeping it open, employing workers and producing valuable coal.
This is a fight for Britain’s future, and the extent to which we succeed or fail fundamentally affects other workers and the nation’s destiny.
The rail and steel industries, now under increasing attack must learn the lessons of the last 12 months, and understand that the surest way to save British steel and the railways is to take combined action-and not leave trade union colleagues isolated when facing a concerted attack by the ruling class.
But ours is not just a defensive fight. Our generation of trade unionist has a responsibility to make the dreams of the Socialist pioneers a reality. In fighting to save our nationalised industries and public services, we must win for them and for the British people the democracy, accountability, efficiency and profitability they have been denied over the past 40 years.
Looking ahead, one immediate task facing us – and the Movement – is building the campaign to release our members, jailed as political prisoners fighting against pit closures. We must win reinstatement at work for our members sacked during and since the end of the strike. This task is as crucial to our Union as the fight to save the industry itself.
We make it clear to the next Labour Government that it must first of all ensure that it frees from jail and reinstates at work any miners who remain victimised.
The next Labour Government must then address itself to the National Coal Board. It is no longer enough to merely call for the dismissal of ]an McGregor, although the NUM and the Movement must continue to do that. The next Labour Government must remove all senior Coal Board personnel, and all area and local managers who have not only participated during the last two years in the deliberate destruction of our industry, but who have viciously attacked our members and sought to humiliate them since the end of the strike.
The NUM must then be invited to share in the responsibility of running the National Coal Board as it should be run – of the people, by the people and for the people. The Board must be accountable to those who work within our industry, and the Chairman should be the nominee of the unions. Only in this way can the great wrongs of the past five years be righted, and our industry expanded and developed in line with 1974 Plan for Coal.
It follows that we must therefore make the broad alliances necessary to create the conditions for the swiftest possible return of a Labour Government – one which will mobilise a march towards full employment, while campaigning for peace, the removal of all nuclear bases from Britain, and economic justice throughout the world.
Despite the struggles and turmoil of the past two years, our Union will continue to participate in plans for a new Miners’ International Organisation, incorporating East and West by bridging the ideological differences and ripping away the barriers that have separated workers for far too long.
As we look at rising unemployment within Europe, the threat to other EEC coal industries, as we view the horror of incessant warfare in the Lebanon, or watch while thousands die of hunger in the Third World, we cannot forget that our own struggles are connected with those of workers everywhere.
As we see the nuclear madness of the ever-increasing arms race, we must re-dedicate ourselves to campaign for peace – without world peace there is no hope for any of us. We must campaign until the billions spent on weapons of death and destruction are spent instead on providing an improved quality of life.
This Conference is a vital one. It follows a historic strike which has united our communities as never before. It is true to say that in 1984/85, for the first time in 50 years, many of our people discovered the real meaning of the word “community”.
But there are also indications (carefully nurtured by our enemies in the Board and Government) of splits and divisions in our great Union-divisions which would inevitably affect our ability to fight effectively to stop pit closures, save jobs or indeed to represent as powerfully as we should the interests of the entire membership.
At a time when the industry is under attack from the ruthless Government seen in our lifetime, it would be a disaster for every member of the Union if any breakaway were to take place. But, as history shows all too clearly, it would be most disastrous of all for those who themselves formed any such breakaway.
I call on all sections of our Union to take strength from the lessons of 1984/85, and from the fact that we are all part of a national Union.
I pledge for my part to accept the decisions of Conference – whether it be on policy or Rules – and to work wholeheartedly for them. No matter what my personal view, I will fight for the policies you decide, and I believe that all Areas of the Union should give the same commitment. That is my responsibility as President and I carry it proudly.
I would like, in conclusion, to express my appreciation of the unfailing solidarity and comradeship shared throughout our struggle by the three National Officials. Michael McGahey, Peter Heathfield and I have worked together in a way which has helped me meet and combat the unremitting attacks of our class enemy.
Our Union’s contribution to history and to humanity is in itself a triumph – let our great strike be the beginning of the fight not only to save jobs and pits, but to strengthen our Union, and help create the conditions for electing a Labour Government pledged to fulfil the aims and principles upon which the NUM was founded.
Join the discussion about what really happened during the strike with former striking miner Ian Lavery MP; John Hendy KC, who represented the NUM in the 1980s; Mike Jackson, Lesbians & Gays Support the Miners co-founder; Chris Peace, Orgreave Truth & Justice Campaign; Jon Trickett, Councillor elected during the strike & campaigner for coalfield communities and more.
This speech was made by Arthur Scargill, the then General Secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers, to the 1985 NUM Conference.
The UK Government Must Deliver on Promise of Orgreave Inquiry
“Much of the police conduct at Orgreave, and on picket lines throughout the strike, was out of control. This has taken a personal toll on many of us miners and our families. Many of us are still traumatised, many have died”
Kevin Horne, miner arrested at Orgreave
By the Orgreave Truth & Justice Campaign
The Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign have had an extremely positive meeting at the Home Office with the Home Secretary, Yvette Cooper to discuss the Labour Government’s commitment to an Orgreave Inquiry/Investigation and the options and format of the inquiry. The meeting gave arrested miners and their wives and supporters an opportunity to impress upon the Home Secretary why an Orgreave inquiry needs to start as a matter of urgency to ensure it happens in their lifetime.
Previous Conservative Home Secretaries have refused to hold any kind of Orgreave inquiry but the Labour Party have promised to hold some kind of Orgreave inquiry as a manifesto commitment for the last 8 years.
Kevin Horne, miner arrested at Orgreave said:
“It is now over 40 years since striking miners, fighting to save our jobs and communities, were attacked and arrested by police for picketing the Orgreave coking plant during the 84/5 miners’ strike. As the years role by and many miners have died, those of us left, and our families need answers about what the government planned and what the police did.”
95 striking miners were arrested at Orgreave on 18 June 1984 after police in full riot gear with truncheons, dogs and charging horses, brutally attacked the miners gathering at a National Union of Mineworkers picket at the Orgreave coking plant. The miners were later charged with either riot or unlawful assembly with threats of a life prison sentence. Almost a year later when the cases went to trial in May 1985, it became clear that the police had lied in their evidence and that they had perjured themselves in court. The trial collapsed after 48 days of hearings, the Prosecution abandoned the case when it was obvious that many officers had large parts of their statements dictated to them.
Kate Flannery, Secretary of the Orgreave Truth and Justice Campaign (OTJC) said:
“Our latest OTJC report, submitted to the Home Secretary and all major political parties and MPs, describes the Conservative Government’s political interference and involvement in the 1984/5 miners’ strike and how they used the courts, violent policing and the media to give the police the confidence to behave with impunity throughout the miners’ strike and years later at Hillsborough. The Orgreave trial was set up to be a ‘show trial’ but when the police’s violent behaviour and lies became obvious and the miners were acquitted, the miners never got their chance in court to say what really happened and no one in the police or government has ever been held to account”
Kevin Horne, miner arrested at Orgreave also said:
“Much of the police conduct at Orgreave, and on picket lines throughout the strike, was out of control. This has taken a personal toll on many of us miners and our families. Many of us are still traumatised, many have died and are now elderly and ill and after 40 years it is important that an Inquiry is conducted quickly. It is in the public interest to hold an Orgreave inquiry. We thank all our supporters during and since the strike, throughout Britain and throughout the world for the wonderful solidarity we received, then and now”
A follow up briefing meeting held in parliament with a number of MPs gave the OTJC an opportunity to discuss the need for an inquiry to take place urgently. Plenty of information exists and has already been obtained to give an inquiry a substantial head start to deliver truth and justice. The OTJC does not demand an expensive, overly-long Inquiry.
The Inquiry must have the power to require all the relevant information and evidence to be produced to it.
Those who have an interest in the Inquiry must be able to fully participate in order to lend their experience, knowledge and understanding to the process.
The panel conducting the inquiry/investigation must include a range of skills so that people can have confidence it will fully understand the issues and be independent and objective in its approach.
The Inquiry must be transparent, open and accessible and its conclusions publicly explained in an authoritative way.
Many politicians, local councils, trade unions, the Bishop of Sheffield, Pete Wilcox, the South Yorkshire Mayor, Oliver Coppard and thousands of supporters are amongst the many who want to see an Orgreave inquiry.
