National union of Mineworkers ( Great Britain ) - wikipedia National union of Mineworkers ( Great Britain ) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. ( June 2011 ) National Union of Mineworkers Founded January 1945 ( 1945 - 01 ) Predecessor Miners ' Federation of Great Britain Members 423,085 ( 1946 ) 750 ( 2016 ) Affiliation TUC, Labour, NSSN Key people Chris Kitchen ( secretary ) Nicky Wilson ( president ) Office location 2 Huddersfield Road, Barnsley Country United Kingdom Website www.num.org.uk The National Union of Mineworkers ( NUM ) is a trade union for coal miners in Great Britain, formed in 1945 from the Miners ' Federation of Great Britain ( MFGB ). The NUM took part in three national miners ' strikes, in 1972, 1974 and 1984 -- 85. After the 1984 -- 85 strike and the subsequent closure of most of Britain 's coal mines, it became a much smaller union. It had around 170,000 members when Arthur Scargill became leader in 1981, a figure which had fallen in 2015 to an active membership of around 100. Contents 1 Origins 2 Post-1945 3 The Miners ' Strike, 1984 -- 85 4 Decline 5 Areas 6 Landmark events 7 Officers 8 Notable people 9 See also 10 References 10.1 Citations 10.2 Bibliography 11 Further reading 12 External links Origins The Miners ' Federation of Great Britain was established in Newport, Monmouthshire in 1888 but did not function as a unified, centralised trade union for all miners. Instead the federation represented and co-ordinated the affairs of the existing local and regional miners ' unions whose associations remained largely autonomous. The South Wales Miners ' Federation, founded in 1898, joined the MFGB in 1899, while the Northumberland Miners ' Association and the Durham Miners ' Association joined in 1907 and 1908, respectively. Post-1945 In January 1945 the MFGB was superseded by the National Union of Mineworkers. Within the organisation, each coalfield continued to exercise a degree of autonomy, having its own district association, president, general secretary, and headquarters. Originally, a national strike required a two - thirds majority in a ballot of members but proved near impossible to achieve and the majority was reduced to 55 % in 1970 and to 50 % in 1984. Regions of the union could call their own strikes. Different areas varied as to how militant they were and it was not uncommon for animosity to exist between areas. On formation, the NUM had the following areas : Area Membership ( 1944 ) Bristol 400 Cokemen 3,000 Craftsmen Group No. 1 15,200 Craftsmen Group No. 2 12,200 Cumberland 7,500 Derbyshire 25,000 Durham 106,472 Kent 5,100 Lancashire and Cheshire 40,000 Leicester 4,000 Midlands 30,000 Northumberland 28,561 North Wales 7,526 Nottingham 30,000 Power 13,561 Scotland 51,000 Somerset 2,600 South Derbyshire 5,743 South Wales 100,000 Yorkshire 115,000 The NUM was strongly supportive of the Labour Party. During the first government of Harold Wilson, hundreds of pits closed and thousands of miners left the coal industry but the NUM leadership put up little resistance to the programme. Unofficial strikes were common in the coal industry. Following an unofficial strike in 1969 about the pay of surface workers, it was decided that the threshold for the ballot should be lowered. The NUM opposed membership of the European Economic Community, beginning with a unanimous conference vote in 1971. During the 1975 referendum, there was a debate within the NUM over the sponsorship giving to Labour MPs in coalfields, given how many of them were campaigning in favour of membership and defying the NUM policy. The Yorkshire Area passed a resolution that tightened the conditions for sponsorship of MPs. The miners ' strike, 1984 -- 85 Main article : UK miners ' strike ( 1984 -- 1985 ) In the 1980s, because many coal mines were unprofitable, the Conservative government headed by Margaret Thatcher sought to close them and privatise the rest. In some areas, the NUM was militant and threatened strikes in 1981 when the government raised the issue, but as the government was not ready for a confrontation, it negotiated a settlement with the union and backed down from the closures. In what the NUM considered a confrontational move, Ian MacGregor, who had overseen cutbacks and closures at British Steel Corporation, was appointed head of the National Coal Board by Thatcher in 1983. In 1984, after secretly stockpiling coal at power stations, the NCB announced the closure of 20 pits. Local regions organised strikes but NUM President Arthur Scargill, without a national ballot of the union 's membership, declared a national strike in March 1984 which was ruled illegal in England, making striking miners ineligible for benefits. Support for the strike was not universal ; in some areas such as North Wales support was small but great in others such as South Wales. Also, Yorkshire was more enthusiastic about the strike than Nottinghamshire where many miners refused to strike. Margaret Thatcher described the strikers as the `` enemy within '', but Scargill was equally confrontational. Picket lines were stationed outside the pits and other industrial sites requiring coal and violent clashes with police were common. Strikers had no source of income and some were forced by circumstances to cross the picket lines as reluctant `` scabs ''. The strike ended on 3 March 1985 and the miners returned to work without agreement with the NCB. The strike was unsuccessful and its failure was an era - defining moment in British politics. After the strike large numbers of collieries were closed. The strike 's effectiveness was reduced because the NUM leaders refused to nationally ballot members on strike action and argued that it was an issue for each area to decide. In some areas that held ballots the majority voted against striking but were subject to picketing from areas that had declared a strike. The strike was deemed illegal by the courts on the basis that the NUM rulebook required a secret ballot for a national strike. Although working miners had instigated the legal action, the NUM leadership presented it as an attack on its right to conduct its own internal affairs. The lack of a ballot reduced public support and made it possible for the government to use legal and police powers against the union without political consequences. The closed shop in the state - owned coal sector was ended when a breakaway union, the Union of Democratic Mineworkers, was formed mostly by miners in Nottinghamshire and South Derbyshire who felt betrayed by the NUM for insisting on a strike after their area ballot had rejected strike action. In contrast, the Leicestershire area stayed in the NUM, as the area leader Jack Jones had kept good relations with the local miners by openly defying Scargill. After the end of the strike, the NUM took an active leadership role in working to align the labour movement in the UK more closely with LGBT rights issues. Following the Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners campaign of 1984 -- 85, the organisation 's Welsh chapters became the first non-LGBT organisation to participate in London 's Lesbian and Gay Pride parade, and at the Labour Party 's 1985 policy conference, the NUM 's unanimous block voting support contributed to the successful passage of Composite 26, a resolution which formally committed the party to an LGBT rights platform. Decline Long based in London, Scargill commissioned a new headquarters building in Sheffield, which was completed in 1988. However, with membership declining, the union relocated again in 1992, to share the Yorkshire Area offices in Barnsley. Although weakened by the strike, the NUM was still a significant force into the early 1990s. A major scheme of closures of deep mines was announced by the government in 1992. The NUM ran a national ballot on possible strike action, and this was passed by members. It worked with the National Association of Colliery Overmen, Deputies and Shotfirers to challenge the closures in the High Court ; the court imposed an emergency injunction against the closures and the strike action was called off. However, from mid-1993, the mines started closing ; the number of working miners and therefore also the membership of the union continued to fall. In 2011 the union had 1,855 members. In 2012 the union 's general secretary, Chris Kitchen, admitted it was in decline after the investigative website Exaro revealed that in 2011 the Derbyshire branch had just one member who was not a paid official. Filings with the Trades Union Certification Officer showed that the NUM 's Derbyshire branch had just four members, three of whom were paid officials. In 2012 it emerged in court cases between the NUM and its former president Arthur Scargill that a substantial proportion of union members ' subscriptions was being spent on expenses for Scargill, including unauthorised rent payments for a flat in London 's Barbican Estate. A further 540 miners ' job losses were announced in January 2013. Areas As of 2016, the following area unions are affiliated to the NUM : Cokemen Colliery Officials and Staffs North East Northumberland Scotland South Wales Landmark events 1947 : nationalisation of 958 coal mines under state control ; 400 small mines were left in private hands. 1969 : a widespread unofficial strike over the pay of surface workers leads to a change in the rules on authorising a national strike : the threshold in a ballot is reduced from two - thirds to 55 %. 1972 : Official national strike. This ended in success after the Battle of Saltley Gate, where the miners ' pickets were supported by solidarity strikes by engineering workers in the Birmingham area. 1973 - 4 : Three - Day Week results from an overtime ban from December 1973. A vote by the NUM to strike at the end of January led Prime Minister Ted Heath to call a general election, in which he was defeated. The new government of Harold Wilson accepted the pay demand. 1984 - 5 : National strike, which divided the union after the strike motion was rejected in several local ballots and the executive refused to hold a national ballot. After almost a year, the NUM returned to work having won almost no concessions. End of the closed shop with the establishment of the UDM. 1994 : privatisation of the fifteen state - owned coal mines still in operation, with ownership transferred to the company RJB Mining. Officers Presidents 1945 : Will Lawther 1954 : Ernest Jones 1960 : Alwyn Machen 1960 : Sidney Ford 1971 : Joe Gormley 1982 : Arthur Scargill ( Honorary President from 2002 ) 2002 : Ian Lavery 2010 : Nicky Wilson Vice Presidents 1945 : Jim Bowman 1950 : Ernest Jones 1950 : Edward Jones 1960 : Fred Collindridge 1962 : Sid Schofield 1972 : Mick McGahey 1987 : Sammy Thompson 1989 : Vacant 1992 : Frank Cave 2002 : Keith Stanley 2010 : Nicky Wilson 2010 : Wayne Thomas General Secretaries 1945 : Ebby Edwards 1946 : Arthur Horner 1959 : Will Paynter 1968 : Lawrence Daly 1984 : Peter Heathfield 1992 : Arthur Scargill 2002 : Steve Kemp 2007 : Chris Kitchen Notable people Dave Feickert, Industrial Relations Officer then Head of Research 1983 to 1993, later Mines Safety advisor NZ and China. See also Organised Labour portal History of coal mining in Britain Trades Union Congress References Citations Jump up ^ Labour Party, Report of the Forty - Fifth Annual Conference of the Labour Party, p. 77 Jump up ^ Trade Union Certification Officer, `` Annual return for a trade union : National Union of Mineworkers '' ( 2016 ) Jump up ^ `` Archived copy ''. Archived from the original on 11 March 2012. Retrieved 14 February 2012. Jump up ^ Michael Crick ( 4 October 2012 ). `` Scargill 's fight to remain in his NUM Barbican flat ''. Channel 4 News. Retrieved 13 March 2016. Jump up ^ James McCarthy ( 26 December 2015 ). `` Now down to just 100 active members -- the decline of the once - mighty NUM ''. Wales Online. Retrieved 13 March 2016. Jump up ^ National Union of Mineworkers 1989, p. 7. ^ Jump up to : National Union of Mineworkers 1989, p. 67. Jump up ^ Lewis, E.D. The Rhondda Valleys, Phoenix House : London, ( 1959 ) pg 172 Jump up ^ The Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales. John Davies, Nigel Jenkins, Menna Baines and Peredur Lynch ( 2008 ) pg827 ISBN 978 - 0 - 7083 - 1953 - 6 ^ Jump up to : Pierre - François GOUIFFES. `` MARGARET THATCHER & THE MINERS '' ( PDF ). Retrieved 28 February 2015. Jump up ^ Arthur Marsh and Victoria Ryan, Historical Directory of Trade Unions, vol. 2, pp. 198 -- 199. Membership figures are from immediately prior to the formation of the NUM. ^ Jump up to : Douglas, David John. Pit Sense versus the State : A history of militant miners in the Doncaster area. London : Phoenic Press. pp. 10 -- 13. ISBN 0 - 948984 - 26 - 0. Jump up ^ Taylor, Andrew ( 1984 ). The Politics of the Yorkshire Miners. Beckenham : Croom Helm. pp. 153 -- 155. ISBN 0 - 7099 - 2447 - X. ^ Jump up to : `` The Miner 's Strike ''. British Broadcasting Corporation. 15 August 2008. Retrieved 28 February 2015. Jump up ^ Hutton, Guthrie ( 2005 ). Coal Not Dole Memories of the 1984 / 85 miners ' strike. Catrine, Ayrshire : Stenlake Publishing. p. 8. ISBN 9781840333299. ^ Jump up to : The miners ' strike, The BBC, retrieved 3 December 2011 Jump up ^ `` When miners and gay activists united : the real story of the film Pride ''. The Guardian ( London ), 31 August 2014. Jump up ^ Stephen Brooke, Sexuality, Family Planning, and the British Left from the 1880s to the Present Day. Oxford University Press, 2012. ISBN 9780199562541. pp. 245 -- 246. Jump up ^ Hatherley, Owen ( November 2010 ). A Guide to the New Ruins of Great Britain. New York : Verso Books. pp. 104 -- 5. Jump up ^ `` Sheffield casino plan approved for ex-NUM headquarters ''. BBC. 19 December 2011. Retrieved 19 April 2012. Jump up ^ Lorenzo Bosi, Marco Giugni and Katrin Uba, The consequences of social movements, pp. 54 -- 55 Jump up ^ Documents lodged on the website of the Trades Union Certification Officer, The website of the Trades Union Certification Officer, retrieved 8 January 2013 Jump up ^ `` NUM branch with 4 members pays £ 80k per year to top officials ''. Exaro news. Retrieved 8 January 2013. Jump up ^ Documents lodged on the website of the Trades Union Certification Officer, The website of the Trades Union Certification Officer, retrieved 8 January 2013 Jump up ^ `` Arthur Scargill loses London flat case ''. BBC News. 21 December 2012. Retrieved 6 February 2014. Jump up ^ Barnard, Stephanie ( 18 December 2012 ), `` Maltby miners face Christmas gloom '', BBC News, retrieved 8 January 2013 Jump up ^ Trade Union Certification Officer. `` Trade unions : the current list and schedule ''. gov.uk. UK Government. Retrieved 14 July 2016. Jump up ^ Strike : 358 Days that Shook the Nation. London : Sunday Times. p. 5. ISBN 0 - 340 - 38445 - X. Jump up ^ Douglas, David John. Pit Sense versus the State : A history of militant miners in the Doncaster area. London : Phoenic Press. pp. 11 -- 12. ISBN 0 - 948984 - 26 - 0. Jump up ^ Hudson, Ray ( November 2001 ). `` The Changing Geography of the British Coal Industry : Nationalisation, Privatisation and the Political Economy of Energy Supply, 1947 -- 1997 ''. University of Sunderland. Archived from the original on 3 December 2005. Retrieved 6 March 2009. Jump up ^ `` Dave Feickert -- a Short Biography ''. Bibliography National Union of Mineworkers ( 1989 ), A Century of Struggle Britain 's Miners in Pictures 1889 -- 1989, National Union of Mineworkers, ISBN 0 - 901959 06 5 Further reading Arnot, Robert Page. The Miners : a History of the Miners ' Federation of Great Britain, 1889 - 1910. London : Allen and Unwin, 1949. Arnot, Robert Page. South Wales Miners, Glowyr de Cymru : a History of the South Wales Miners ' Federation ( 1914 -- 1926 ). Cardiff : Cymric Federation Press, 1975. Arnot, Robert Page. The Miners ; One Union, One Industry : a History of the National Union of Mineworkers, 1939 -- 46. London : Allen and Unwin, 1979. Ashworth, William, and Mark Pegg. History of the British Coal Industry : Volume 5 : 1946 -- 1982 : The Nationalized Industry ( 1986 ) Baylies, Carolyn. The History of the Yorkshire Miners, 1881 -- 1918 Routledge ( 1993 ). Beckett, Francis and David Hencke, Marching to the fault line : The Miners ' Strike and the battle for industrial Britain ( 2009 ) on 1980s Benson, John. `` Coalmining '' in Chris Wrigley, ed. A History of British industrial relations, 1875 -- 1914 ( Univ of Massachusetts Press, 1982 ), pp 187 -- 208. Benson, John. British Coal - Miners in the Nineteenth Century : A Social History Holmes & Meier, ( 1980 ) online Rowe, J.W.F. Wages In the coal industry ( 1923 ). Supple, Barry. The History of the British Coal Industry : Volume 4 : 1913 -- 1946 : The Political Economy of Decline ( 1988 ) excerpt and text search Towers, Brian. `` Running the gauntlet : British trade unions under Thatcher, 1979 -- 1988. '' Industrial & Labor Relations Review 42 # 2 ( 1989 ) : 163 -- 188. Waller, Robert. The Dukeries Transformed : A history of the development of the Dukeries coal field after 1920 ( Oxford U.P., 1983 ) on the Dukeries Williams, Chris. Capitalism, community and conflict : The south Wales coalfield, 1898 -- 1947 ( U of Wales Press, 1998 ). External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to National Union of Mineworkers. Official website BBC : Miners strike 1984 Spartacus Educational Catalogue of NUM archives held at the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick Miners ' Federation of Great Britain ( MFGB ) and National Union of Mineworkers ( NUM ) Presidents 1889 Pickard 1904 En. Edwards 1912 Smillie 1922 Smith 1929 Richards 1931 Eb. Edwards 1932 Lee 1934 J. Jones 1939 Lawther 1954 Er. Jones 1960 Machen 1960 Ford 1971 Gormley 1982 Scargill 2002 Lavery 2012 Wilson Vice-Presidents 1889 Woods 1909 Smillie 1912 Harvey 1914 House 1917 Smith 1922 Walsh 1924 Richards 1929 Eb. Edwards 1931 Lee 1932 J. Jones 1933 Davies 1934 Lawther 1939 Bowman 1950 Er. Jones 1954 Ed. Jones 1960 Collindridge 1963 Bullough 1969 Schofield 1973 McGahey 1987 Thompson 1989 Vacant 1992 Cave 2002 Stanley 2010 Wilson 2012 Thomas General Secretaries 1889 Ashton 1919 Hodges 1924 Cook 1932 Eb. Edwards 1946 Horner 1959 Paynter 1968 Daly 1984 Heathfield 1992 Scargill 1992 Vacant ? 2002 Kemp 2007 Kitchen Treasurers 1889 En. Edwards 1904 Abraham 1918 Robson 1921 Richardson MFGB affiliates Bristol Cleveland Cokemen Cumberland Derbyshire Durham Forest of Dean Kent Lancashire and Cheshire Leicestershire Midland Counties ( Warwickshire ) Northumberland North Wales Nottinghamshire Scotland ( Ayrshire Fife and Kinross Lanarkshire Mid and East Lothian Mid and West Lothian Stirling ) Somerset South Derbyshire South Wales Yorkshire Strikes 1893 1912 1926 1969 1972 1984 -- 1985 hide Trades Union Congress Positions General Secretary Deputy General Secretary Assistant General Secretary General Council President Bodies General Council Parliamentary Committee Wales TUC Affiliates Accord Advance Aegis AUE ASLEF AEP AFA BFAWU BSU BALPA BDA BOSTU CSP CWU Community EIS Equity FDA FBU GMB HCSA MU Napo NACO NAHT NASS NASUWT NEU NUJ Nautilus NUM NGSU POA PFA Prospect PCS RCM RMT SCP SoR TSSA UCAC USDAW UNISON Unite URTU UCU WGGB Retrieved from `` https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=National_Union_of_Mineworkers_(Great_Britain)&oldid=838985157 '' Categories : 1945 establishments in the United Kingdom Mining in the United Kingdom Mining trade unions National Union of Mineworkers ( Great Britain ) Organisations based in South Yorkshire Trade unions established in 1945 Trade unions affiliated with the Labour Party ( UK ) Hidden categories : Articles needing additional references from June 2011 All articles needing additional references Use dmy dates from September 2015 Pages using deprecated image syntax All articles with unsourced statements Articles with unsourced statements from February 2015 Articles with unsourced statements from November 2013 Talk Contents About Wikipedia Cymraeg Deutsch Italiano Nederlands Norsk Svenska Edit links This page was last edited on 30 April 2018, at 14 : 59. 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Question: 1. who was the leader of the national union of mineworkers
Answer: Nicky Wilson