The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
Thatcher set to call out the troops as she feared defeat by the miners
Showdown: State of emergency plan if dockers’ backing hit food supplies
Margaret Thatcher secretly considered calling out the troops at the height of the miners’ strike amid fears that union action could destroy her Conservative government, according to newly-released files.
Government papers from 1984, released by the National Archives, show ministers were so concerned at the outbreak of a national docks strike while the miners were still out, they considered declaring a state of emergency.
Plans were drawn up for thousands of service personnel to commandeer trucks to move vital supplies of foodandcoal around the country.
It was probably the closest Mrs Thatcher came to defeat in her battle with the miners, but theschemewas never implemented after the dockers’ action petered out after less than two weeks. The epic, 12-month confrontation between the Conservative government and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and its left-wing president Arthur Scargill was one of the defining episodes of t he Thatcher era. It saw some
o f the worst industrial violence the country had witnessed, with hundreds injured in brutal picket-line clashes between police and miners, and ended in crushing defeat for the NUM.
From the outset both sides were clear there was more at stake than the plan by the state- owned National Coal Board (NCB) to close 20 loss-making pits which triggered the start of the strike in March 1984.
Mr Scargill declared the NUMwas engaged in nothing less than a “social and industrial Battle of Britain” while at No 10, one official wrote it was “a unique opportunity to break the power of the militants in the NUM”.
By the summer both sides appeared locked in a lengthywarof attrition, until early July when the escalation of a dispute at Immingham docks into a national strike appeared to offer the miners the chance of a breakthrough.
In No 10, John Redwood, the head of the policy unit, warned that the NCB’s position was “crumbling” but said that giving in to the unions would be “the end of effective government” in Britain. “TheLeft’saimis to pave the way for the ultimate defeat of the Government by destroying its policies and its credibility,” he wrote in amemorandumto Mrs Thatcher. “Its purpose is to oppose and destroy.”
OnJuly 16, with the Ministry of Agriculture warning of panic-buying of food stocks if the docks strike took hold, Mrs Thatcher summoned a meeting of key ministers to discuss the declaration of a state of emergency under the Emergency Powers Act ( EPA). It was quickly agreed that an initial as-
“Both sides appeared locked in a lengthy war of attrition”
sessment that 2,800 troops could move 1,000tons of goods a day using around 50 lorries was “far too low” for what was needed.
Ministers, however, were also nervous that calling out the Army could simply make matters worse.Nevertheless, officials continued to dust off plans which suggested 4,500 military drivers and 1,650 tipper trucks – around 10% of the national stock – would be needed to keep coal supplies moving.
On July 18, the armed forces minister John Stanley reported that the Ministry of Defence was reassessing its contingency plans. Three days later the dock strike was ended. But while the immediate crisis for the government appeared to be over, some ministers feared the struggle was not going their way. Since 1981, ministers had been secretly preparing for the showdown with miners which many believed was inevitable – covertly building up coal stocks.
The final crisis for the government came in October with a threatened walkout by the pit deputies union, NACODS. Without the men responsible for pit safety, those mines which had refused to join the strike and had carried on working would have to close, once again threatening coal stocks.