British miners' wives rally in support of strikers

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A delegate conference of women representatives of all the coalfields i miners' dispute met in Chesterfield on November 10 and 11. As a highly successful conference, a national women's organisation ha lished. Delegates endorsed the statement below and reaffirmed their ment to the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in their struggle To further strengthen the organisation of women's groups which has been - To develop relationships between the NUM and the women's organisation - To campaign on issues which affect mining communities, particularly peace, "Mines, Not Missiles" was the theme of a national women's march in York, England, on Nov. 3. The message sent by this slogan was first of all a protest against the Conservative government, which spends millions of dollars on nuclear weapons and at the same time closes mines and destroys communities.

Equally important, however, is the fact that through this and similar demonstrations British women are serving notice that they are no longer passive, non-political bystanders. With their militant activities in the mining communities and in the peace movement women are out on the front line.

The close relationship between the two movements was underlined at a solidarity meeting held in Lancashire, England, on Oct. 20. Miners from all the major coalfields and their wives met with supporters from the rest of Europe and the United States. The discussion at the opening session linked the activities of the miners' wives and the fight of the Greenham Common women against deployment of Cruise missiles.

In order to describe this new movement and place it in its historical perspective we reprint a slightly abridged article from the Oct. I, 1984, issue of International Viewpoint.—The Editors.

"What we are doing as women in this 1984, and possibly 1985, miners' strike is making history. We are setting a pattern for the future for the involvement of women in political struggle which will show what a formidable force we can be....

These were the closing words of Maureen Douglass of Barnsley Women Against Pit Closures to the mass rally of 10,000 women from the mining communities which took place last May. These women are indeed making history in the power and dynamic of their actions. Mack McGahey, the miners' union vice president, has even gone so far as to say that if the women had supported the miners in this way during the 1926 general strike, there might have been a different outcome.

In fact, miners' wives were organized in 1926 but in a different way and with a different impact. The comparison is very enlightening.

In her book, "Women and the Miners' Lockout, Marion Phillips, the then editor of Labour Women, a Labour Party women's journal, records how miners' wives were involved in public rallies and demonstrations as well as organizing food parcels and fund-raising. In July 1926 an 8000-strong annual demonstration of Labour women was turned over to the theme of the pit strike and miners' wives led the march through London.

The miners' wives were not organized in local and national groups as they are today, but the Labour Party women's sections and national committee worked closely with them. Marion Phillips records how she was approached by the Miners Federation to set up a women's committee to organize fund raising and to be a liaison with miners' families. This committee was later to help with caring for miners' children when starvation began to set in, and it raised vast sums of money during the nine-month lockout.

Women lead

So, women have organized before, but in 1984, with the experience of the women's movement and the changes in the labor movement behind us, the miners' wives are achieving something new.

These women are not just supporting the miners' strike through organizing food distribution, fund raising, and welfare rights advice. They are politically leading through taking their own initiatives-on the picket lines and in mass demonstrations. The demonstration in London on Aug. I1, the first national march in the city since the strike began, was a classic example of this.

Margaret Thatcher, the British prime minister, was safely ensconced in a villa in Switzerland when the 20,000 to 30,000 miners' wives marched through the streets of London chanting "We will win, we will win, we will win."

This time they were supported by Labour Party women and other feminist groups. The men, including Arthur Scargill (the Miners' union president) and Tony Benn (the leader of the Labour Party's left wing), were bringing up the rear.

Pickets, not pin-ups

The self-activity of the women, and in particular, their role on the picket lines has had a massive impact within the labor movement. The National Union of Mineworkers had previously been renowned for its nude pin-ups on page 3 of the Yorkshire Miner (the union's regional journal). The women have been taunted by miners who tell them to go back to the kitchen sink. The women often say that at first their own husbands were also aghast. "But now, says Betty Heathfield, who is on the recently formed National Coordinating Committee, "it has created a fantastic understanding between the men and women."

In a speech to a fringe meeting at the OT CHE SI In their new-found strength the miners' wives have also linked up with other women, not, as in the past when Labour Party women were "helping out" in the 1926 strike, but through action and self-organization. In fact, many miners' wives were directly inspired by the example of the women at Greenham Common.

New strength Lorraine Bowler of the Barnsley group explained it this way: "It's because of the women's movement that we got organized. Women are now much more militant and informed. Some of our women would call themselves feminists; some wouldn't. Many of our meetings are explicitly women only; after all, the men have their branch meetings...

It is clear that the self-organization of the women will have a lasting impact. These women will not, like their sisters before them, be left out of the history books. Betty Heathfield knows what she would like to see. "No union or strike will ever be the same again. Now we need to get the wives of dockers, railway workers, and lorry drivers involved.... "We've got a national coordinating effort for the women underway now, because during the strike women have changed a lot. They are saying that when the strike is over they will not disperse, and we don't want them to either. The strike has been the quickest social and political education we could have gone through.... Now we have become political animals. It would be a shame to let this go. It shows what can be done."

Indeed it does. It shows that women themselves can make history by organizing together.

Miners' wives in conference wolved in the result of this s been estabtotal committo retain pits, women's organisation and ensure victory to prevent pit closures and protect mining comeducation for working-class women. of the national women's organisation at all levels.

NUM press release DECEMBER 1984

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MINEN VIVES SUPPORT CPAUP YORK SHIRE CC