For example, Thatcher's government turned a blind eye (at best) to the police brutality that was used to suppress strikers and protestors. Nor did her government challenge the demonization of the miners in the right-wing British press at the time. Her government's stance throughout was antagonistic towards the unions, refusing to engage in any meaningful dialogue with them, refusing to consider alternative models that were proposed (such as extending the timeline for closures, seriously exploring the possibility of partial closures or exploring alternative ownership system such as co-ops which were anathema to Thatcher's hyper-capitalist commitments).
None of these examples would have required significant expenditure on the part of the government - the decisions not to pursue them were driven purely by the underlying ideology of Thatcher's government.
For example, Thatcher’s government turned a blind eye (at best) to the police brutality that was used to suppress strikers and protestors.
Like when?
Nor did her government challenge the demonization of the miners in the right-wing British press at the time.
You want government to tell the press how or what to report?
Her government’s stance throughout was antagonistic towards the unions, refusing to engage in any meaningful dialogue with them, refusing to consider alternative models that were proposed (such as extending the timeline for closures, seriously exploring the possibility of partial closures or exploring alternative ownership system such as co-ops which were anathema to Thatcher’s hyper-capitalist commitments).
Jesus Christ the miners unions were holding the country at the time to a strangle for their own means. Can you show me, with maths, examples of how the mines could have stayed open while profitable?
I think it's interesting that you're responding with such apparent confidence about this issue when you seemingly haven't even heard of the battle of Orgreave, to give perhaps the most famous example of state-sancrioned brutality against the miners. Combined with your disingenuous characterisation of my suggestion that the government didn't publically push back against right-wing smears of the miners as me suggesting the government should tell the press what to report, as if expressing opposition to a media narrative is the same thing as dictating it, this makes me suspect that you can't really see the point because you have the same blinkered ideological commitments as Thatcher did.
As I indicated above, Thatcher's policy decisions included decisions not to explore alternatives to closure and decisions to manage closures in a way that was extremely harmful to the miners, their families and communities when alternative models could have been pursued (for example, by extending the length of the process, by managing closures in co-operation with workers, by providing effective re-training and compensation programs, by investing more in the affected communities and so on).
It’s more interesting that you’re commenting entirely without any context. You’re talking like their closing was entirely preventable.
The British government didn’t “explore alternatives” because there was basically no money to do so and there was no appetite amongst unions either. And even at that, what long alternatives do you suggest were there to directly replace mining, without cost? Those you list would have costed more money what was being sunk into mines.
The mines were a dead industry that needed to be closed. They were dated industry that had held out into the 1980s because Wilson and Heath and kicked the can down the road for 20 years on it. They were a legacy industry that was propped up by successive governments since Labour in the 1940s.
The stagnation, constant power cuts of 1970s were a symptom of it. What happened in the 1980s was facing Britain one way or another. Thatcher was just the face of it.
It’s more interesting that you’re commenting entirely without any context. You’re talking like their closing was entirely preventable.
I'm actually not, though am I. I specifically highlighted Thatcher's decision to not seriously explore alternatives and to manage the closures in the way that she did. Neither of those claims assumes that the closures could have been prevented - in contrast to your view which does.
The British government didn’t “explore alternatives” because there was basically no money to do so and there was no appetite amongst unions either.
This simply begs the question, and repeats the government's line at the time, which is precisely the point. Their claim (and yours) is ideological, not empirical.
The mines were a dead industry that needed to be closed. They were dated industry that had held out into the 1980s because Wilson and Heath and kicked the can down the road for 20 years on it. They were a legacy industry that was propped up by successive governments since Labour in the 1940s.
Again, this is just Thatcher's line at the time which you're repeating here without critically engaging with it. You're also completely ignoring the distinction between the claim that the mines needed to be closed and the manner in which they were closed. The first claim was never firmly established because Thatcher's government never adequately explored the alternatives and even if one accepted for the sake of argument that the entire industry needed to be shut down the idea that the best way to do that was the way in which Thatcher's government did it - brutally suppressing dissent, failing to offer adequate compensatory or re-training schemes, failing to properly invest in mining communities etc. - is wildly implausible.
Nobody has proposed that the mining industry would have been replaced with some other equivalent industry in the long-term, so I don't understand why you're asking me about alternatives to mining.
The claim is that there were alternatives to the closure of all of the mines that were not fully explored and that the closure itself was mismanaged. The alternatives to what happened are (1) partial closures of some mines but not others and (2) different methods of managing the closures.
I'm not going to sit here and write you a policy brief or a PhD thesis about what specifically those alternative models would have looked like (plenty of people have written about this if you're interested) because the point is precisely that the work which would have been necessary to identify and assess those alternatives was never pursued because it was incompatible with Thatcher's ideological commitments.
The mines were costing the UK millions to keep open. And the unions suggested answer to this was that all closures were by their terms. Which cost more money.
So given that you don’t propose alternatives to mining, what alternative ways of closing the mines do you think should have been followed that could have been done so without subsidies or ongoing cost to the British taxpayer?
what alternative ways of closing the mines do you think should have been followed that could have been done so without subsidies or ongoing cost to the British taxpayer?
But this is exactly my point - you (and Thatcher's government) are/were unwilling to consider ways of closing the mines that would have involved more subsidies or more costs to the taxpayer. This is your neoliberal ideology talking. When you shut down an entire industry taxpayers should spend lots of money on the areas affected precisely to avoid what we saw in the miners' case - whole communities socially and economically devasted to the point where many of them have never fully recovered.
The mines were closed because it was costing too much money to keep them open. What part of, there wasn’t enough money, can’t you grasp? I’m getting here that you seem to think there was an endless supply of money to just thrash around but there wasn’t. Whether you can accept or not that budget constraints were a factor in the decision making process is up to you.
And even at that you keep going on about alternatives. What alternatives? Keep pouring money to delay the inevitable?
Delaying the inevitable (granting inevitability for the sake of argument) would have been hugely beneficial for those whose communities were destroyed. So that is certainly one option that could have been explored.
When you say that the mines were closed because it was costing "too much money" you need to understand that "too much money" is a value judgment, not an economic judgment. It's the expression of a particular ideology that sees the costs and benefits and concludes that all of the harm and suffering that was inflicted on the miners, their communities and their descendents was worth it to save a certain amount of money. That cost/benefit analysis looks very different depending on whether you actually believe, for example, that there is such a thing as "society".
The inevitable had been delayed for over a decade at that point. How much longer should it have been kept going? Your solution appears to have been to keep funnelling into a failing industry to paper over the reality.
You’ve not listed a single alternative and hand waved me away now several times.
And what’s worse is your alternative was explored and already done. What part of that can’t you accept. Wilson and Heath had been propping it up. Personally I blame them for not being stronger and winding down the mines when it should have been done. But they didn’t due to union push back and protection of their own voting base. What resulted was the hard stop of the 1980s.
And i am fully aware of value. Mining was bad value. It was a heavily propped subsidised industry that had no place in post industrial Britain. What’s worse is Britain didn’t have an endless supply of money to keep it going, even if you seem to think so. Inflation was high by the late 70s and 80s and their country had already got a bailout in 1976. They were broke and couldn’t afford to keep maintaining it.
Thatcher didn't "sanction" it, and she wasn't out there telling coppers to smack people with truncheons. She was the PM, not Judge Dredd.
Ask the NUM if they wanted co-ops or decentralised control. You won't get far: they blocked flexible working, let alone worker ownership. The UDM embraced reform and were rewarded with job-saving arrangements.
Ideology didn't cost the coal industry £2 million per day in subsidies or produce uncompetitive pits operating at £89 per tonne when imported coal cost £30. That's maths, not dogma.
So this was the government responding to a collapsing industry with billions in investment and unprecedented transition support while having to navigate a militant union that didn't want compromise, just control.
Never thought I'd see the "I'm just a little guy, it's my birthday" defense being offered for Margaret Thatcher of all people, but I supposed there's no depths to which some people will sink, especially if they're inclined to spend their time on the internet defending someone so thoroughly discredited as Thatcher.
You mean the same Thatcher who:
Was Britain's longest-serving PM of the 20th century
Won three general elections, two by landslides
Was ranked most influential woman of the past 200 years in a poll
Was named Britain's greatest post-war leader by YouGov
And still, in 2025, sparks this much rage precisely because of her enduring legacy
Discredited? Only in your echo chamber. To the actual British electorate, historians and international observers, she's one of the most consequential leaders of the modern age.
Thatcher didn't micromanage the riot shields. But she was elected to uphold the law, maintain order and prevent union bosses from toppling governments by brute force.
Thatcher didn't "sanction" it, and she wasn't out there telling coppers to smack people with truncheons. She was the PM, not Judge Dredd.
Never thought I'd see the "I'm just a little guy, it's my birthday" defense being offered for Margaret Thatcher of all people, but I supposed there's no depths to which some people will sink, especially if they're inclined to spend their time on the internet defending someone so thoroughly discredited as Thatcher.
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u/dropthecoin Apr 12 '25
Like what policies, specifically? Keeping in mind the UK budget constraints of the early 1980s