INI~()lt)llfl'If)N~

CHRONOLOGY DIRECTACTIONfrom the 'grassroots'

TENS OF THOUSANDS OF MINERS In nearby pickets build a 21ST SEI'TFMBER An estimated AND THEIR FAMILIES ARE TAKING large barricade and set it alight. 6,000 pickets tllke action at Maltby POSITIVE AND IMAGINATIVE DIR- Police cut off the village, baton Colliery as 7 l:onstruction workers ECT ACTION TO FURTHER THEIR pickets, break into people's homes, enter tlie pit. Miners barri- STRUGGLE. HERE WE LIST SOME and gener all y terrori se the whol e cade and blol:k the road into the OF THESE ACTIVITIES, IN THE communi ty. colliery for 3 hours. The police say HOPE OF ENCOURAGING MORE they faced" a continuous barrage of Pickets at barricade SUCH ACTIONS. missiles" . the pit entrance with an overturned colliery van and Coal Hoard bus. 3RD AUGUST. 200 pickets raid a NCB property in the Colliery is dam- Miners sUl:ceed in limiting arrests to Coal Board transport depot at South a~ed. Miners build a barricade and 5, by retreating when police advance, Normanton in Derbyshire, damaging set it ablaze at the gates of the then resuming the offensive. 14 lorries and 2 coaches. , Edlington. ( Information: Daily Telegraph, ( source Scotsman 4/8, Black \)ai Iy Rewrd) Flag 20/8) In Durham a mass picket successfully prevents a solitary scab entering fiTH AUGUST. Using CB radio to Easington colliery. co-ordinate their actions, hundreds ( Information: Guardian and Scots- 22ND SEPTEMBER. 40 pickets and of miners attack Coal Board property man 23/8, Black Flag Autumn 84) supporters burst into a police station at 3 places in Yorkshire and Notting- at Rochester, Kent in a bid to rescue hamshire. First target is Silverhill 30TH AUGUST. South Wales miners a l:omrade who'd been arrested and Colliery, where NCB office windows take direct action to block coal detained. In the ensuing melee 4 are smashed, strikebreakers cars are supplies to steel workers. They people are arrested. damaged, and a police vehicle seize a transporter bridge and use it ( Information: Radio News) rammed. Next stop Harworth Colliery, to prevent ships passing up the 20 miles away. More damage to NCB River Usk, Newport. 24'1'11 SEPTEMBER. More mass action and scabs property. at Malloy Colliery near Rotherham as Simul taneously 10 3 miners occupy a Across into Yorkshire for the final 5,000 pickets beseige the pit. Br itish Steel jetty at Port Tal bot and target as strikers smash £ 2,000 climb onto cranes being used to un- ( Information: Glasgow Evening worth of windows at the 11 storey load coal. Times) Coal Board offices in . ( Information: FRFI Sept., The ( Informathn: Black Flag 20 /8 25 th SFP'n~MBER. Pickets and Miner 21/9) and 3/9" Fight Raci sm, Fight {Inion nffi ci al s persuade a miner to Imperialism (FRFI) Sept., Class 2ND SEPTEMBER. A Coal Board return home after he went into work War) office is demolished with a bulldozer at Wooley Colliery. in an overnight attack. £ 250,000 12TH AUGUST. 5 Coal Board 26 th SEPTEMBER. Miners block worth of damage caused at Thurncroft coaches being fitted out for strike roads into Wl)oley Colliery with Colliery, near Rotherham. breaking are destroyed by fire at rubble a/lll an excavator, to prevent J. Thomp son engineering work s at ( Information: Guardian and Scots- any strikebreaker entering. Pleasley Vale, North Derbyshire. Man 3/9) ( Information: The Express 28/9) ( Information: Black Flag 3/9, 5TH SEPTEMBER. Pickets fell FRFl Sept., Guardian 14/8) trees to block the road used by pol- 26th SEPTEMBER. Before dawn 300 ice to bring in scabs to Tilmanstone striking miners march through the Colliery, Kent. gates and take 22ND AUGUST. Mass actions by over the York shire pit for more than ( Information: Guardian 6/9) picke,ts throughout Yorkshire. At 6 hour s. They occupy the coal prep- miners use a 10 I'll SEPTEMBER. The main aration 1"1 ant and the two winding crane from the pit yard to block the A645 road is closed for over 2 hours towers. Police arrest 43 miners as road with concrete blocks, and hijack as around 4,000 pickets attempt to they leave, but they are later releas- an excavator to help build the barri- prevent 2 strikebreakers from entering ed. cade. At the colliery yard pickets Kellingley Colliery, North Yorkshire. ( Information: Yorkshire EV('ning smash TV cameras, floodlights and ( Information: Daily Tel egraph 7/9) Post 26/9, Newsline 28/9) office windows.

-, 27th SEPTEMBER. Over 4,000 BlLSTON GLEN - DIGGER DUMPED SECRET SERVICE pit:kets erect 2 barricades to prevent On September 21st pickets persuaded strikebreakers entering Allerton There have been several reports of B)'water colliery in Yorkshire. With a lorry driver transporting a JCB soldiers secretly participating in digger not to c:ntc:r this Lothian pit. JIll: main village street blocked for police actions against the miners, Miners suspect that the digger was to ..• hours, it is well over J hours past e.g. in North Yorkshire, in Scotland load coal onto lorries - which would their usual starting time before the 5 at a miners demo in London. Some then be used to take coal out of the scabs can clock on. As the miners Kent miners believe the numbers of pit, to power stations, etc. djsperse, police attack ami assault soldiers involvcd may well be in the pickets, making 6 arrcsts. ( Information: pickets at Bilston hundreds, if not thousands. Glen, September 1984) ( Information: Newsline 28/9, A year or two back there was a local Guardian 28/9, Yorkshire Evening KENT CLAMPDOWN controversy in Kent when it was re- Post 27/9) Miners in a transit van were stopped vealed that the authorities had pur- hy police while following a bus chased 2,000 extra, seemingly 28th SEPTEMBER. Pickets build a totally unnecessary, police uniforms. barricade and halt a police convoy on carryiu& strikebreakers to Tilmanstone Colliery, Kent. Four of the miners Ratepayers raged at this 'absurd ils way to , South waste of money'. Yorkshire. Police vehicles arc pelted were arrested and held in detention with missiles and two vans are over- for TEN DAYS. Now rumour has it that a thousand of lurned. Police set dogs on the pickets Meanwhile residents of Elvini:ton, these uniforms have been delivered and make 5 arrests. Kent have held a meeting to protest to the army at Conn aught Barracks;' about the police occupation of their Dover, Kent ••• (Information' Guardi an 29/9) village - residents have been arrest- ( Information: Kent miners picket- hi OCTOBER. Just after midnight ed for the 'crime' of standing on the ing the NCB IIQ in London, Sept.) pic.'kets ambush a police patrol car pavcment. near Manton colliery. Laler pickets ncarly succeed in breaking Ihrough ( Information: Kent miners picket- ing the NCH HQ in London, Sept. Posties are refusing to cross the Ihe police lines outside pit. 21 miners picket line to deliver mail to arre st s. 1984 and 'The World this Weekend' Radio 4, 23 rd September, 1984) the NCB Head Office in Grosvenor ( Information: Glasgow Evening Place, London. Times 1/10) POLICE HARASSMENT We hope postal workers can keep the 2nd OCTOBER. In the biggest ever Recently police in Bonnyrigg turned miners informed of the alternative picket of Prances Colliery 600 up at the house of an unemployed addresses to which Coal Board mail miners hold up the strikebreakers youth, the son of a miner, and ann- " is directed, so pickets can challenge minibus. Police re-inforcements ounced he was under arrest 'for sec- mail deliveries there too. ondary picketing at Bilston Glen'. eventually force a way into the Fife Even better if NCB post was comp-I';- ' Luckily at that moment his mother pit for the scabs. 11 arrests, 2 rem- etely blacked .•• or, like Grunwicks returned home. After she'd made her anded in custudy. mail during that strike, was re-direct-' feelings known the police left rapidly eJ to Australia .•• ( Informatilm: Scotsman 3/10) with burning ears - and without a prisoner. ( Information: Kent miners picket- Occupations, attacks on Coal Board ing NCH HQ in London, September) property, barricading roads, resist- Meanwhile police in the area continue ance to police oppression - all these to harass people active in the strike, kinds of activities are worrying the threatening them with arrt' ~I :Ind (:oa I Board, the Government and the sittinl!- in police cars outside houses Slate. for hours on end. For not only are such direct actions ( Information: pickets at Hilston (~()(JN'I'I~II·1 eff ccti ve, they challenge the very Glen Sept. 1984) • 'rules of the game'. Many miners are recognising that the laws, the police EVICTIONS - READY TO RESIST INlf()llllll'I'If)N ami the whole legal system arc only Abbey National and the Halifax are there to prolect the power and wealth among the building societies threaten- This news bulletin was collated as a of the rul ing cl asses. 'Acceptable ing Lothian miners with eviction service by anarchists and revolution- tradc union activity', as advocated because they can't pay their mortgage. aries from Edinburgh and Clyde side. hy KinllOck and Co., means accepting But Bilston Glen pickets say they THEIR rules, and gctting smashed. It is a part of our activity that also arc ready to take action at striking includes street collections for the Many, probably most, of the kinds of miners homes to prevent bailiffs miners and solidarity actions, like a actions we're talking about secm to putting anyone out on the streets. small demonstration in Glasi:ow on be the initiatives of miners and their ( Information: pickets at Bilston October 4 th in protest against the filmilics Ihemselvc:s, at till: grassroots Glen, Sept. 1984) • 10 miners killed in South Africa and , level. It's vital that control and dec- the 5 miners killed in Britain. ision making IS exercised by thc 'grass wots', NOT by thc NlJM offic- And why doesn't the NUM paper 'The Please use the information in this bulletin as you see fit •. ials through the official Union struct- Miner' ever report on the kind of act- un:s. ions we've reported here? ANY NEWS FROM YOUR OWN AREA Another danger is the NUM channell- WOULD BE GREATLY APPRECIAT~ There are indications that the NIJM ED •. leadership is trying to control and/or ing all effort into stopping the scabs, Slop somc miners direct action. For and neglecting the equally important Write to COUNTERINFORMATION example, the Yorkshire NllM made an task of SPREADING the strike to Box 81, First of May Bookshop, agrc'clIlent with the police.The Union olher workers. 43 CUlldlemukers Row, Edinburah. would discipline pickets who threw The ability and imagination shown in Printed by the Clyde side Anarchists missiles, and the police promised not the miners direct actions illustrates at Autonomy Press, 64 Queen Street '0 malc baton charges. ( Needless to that working class people have no Glasgow G1. S'I), ,!ie police battered pcople as need of leaders to tell us what to do, \I~;ual------_.~-( Ncwslinc 28th Sept.) whether they're 'right' or 'Ieft-~ng'.