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By Root 3037 0

situation had developed at Hunterston, the deep-water port in Scotland which supplied BSC’s Ravenscraig plant. An important cargo of coal, of the kind necessary for Ravenscraig’s coke ovens, was aboard the bulk carrier Ostia, presently moored in Belfast Lough. BSC told us that if it were not landed quickly they would have to start to run down Ravenscraig. Steel furnaces cannot be shut down fully without irreversible damage and there was every likelihood that the whole plant would have to close for good if coal supplies were halted. As with the earlier dock strike, absurd restrictive practices were the pretext for the strike threat. The normal operation at Hunterston for BSC-destined cargo was divided between work done aboard ship by TGWU registered dockers and work done on-shore by members of the steel union, the ISTC. But 90 per cent of the cargo could be unloaded even without ‘trimming’. BSC wanted to use its employees to unload this coal, but the TGWU was likely to claim that such action was contrary to the National Dock Labour Board agreement in order to provoke a new docks dispute. BSC told us that they were prepared to go to court if the cargo could not be unloaded.

This was a very delicate question and Norman Tebbit stayed in close contact with BSC. The National Dock Labour Board was asked to offer a ruling but delayed and, finally, funked the issue altogether. BSC began the rundown of Ravenscraig on 17 August; they told us that unless the coal was landed by 23 — 4 August, their furnaces would have to be ‘banked’ on 28 — 9 August — that is, kept running at a minimum level, without production. Total closure would follow if coal supplies did not resume.

In the end, after putting off the decision as long as possible, BSC had its employees start unloading the Ostia on the morning of Thursday 23 August. Although BSC acted in conformity with a local port agreement of 1984, TGWU dockers immediately walked out and the union called a second national dock strike.

But in Scotland public opinion was strongly opposed to any action that threatened the future of Ravenscraig. So we had doubts whether the union could sustain a strike across the whole of Scotland, let alone in the United Kingdom as a whole. And we were right. This strike was to cause us much less worry than the first. Though to begin with the strike received considerable support from registered dockers, a majority of ports remained open. Finally, the TGWU called it off on 18 September.

On holiday in Switzerland and Austria between 9 and 27 August I followed the story of the Ostia by telex. In my absence, Peter Walker took effective charge of day-to-day policy in the coal strike. But a prime minister is never really on holiday. I found myself accompanied by the local ambassador, who had previously been one of my private secretaries, five ‘Garden Room girls’ on duty round the clock, a technician to superintend communications with Downing Street and the usual roster of detectives. Red boxes came through the ‘diplomatic bag’. The telex chattered constantly. At least one important decision was demanded of me by Willie Whitelaw over the telephone. Clarissa Eden once said that she sometimes felt that the Suez Canal flowed through her dining-room at No. 10. I sometimes thought at the end of the day that I would look out of the window and see a couple of Yorkshire miners striding down the Swiss slopes. And somehow neither the beautiful mountain scenery nor even my favourite reading — thrillers by Frederick Forsyth and John Le Carré — provided a distraction.

On my return I found the situation much as I had left it, though with one — as it was to turn out — fateful exception. There was a good deal of violence and intimidation still going on. By now 5,897 arrests had been made in the course of the dispute; there had been 1,039 convictions, the most severe sentence being nine months’ imprisonment. Stipendiary magistrates would sit for the first time in early September at Rotherham and Doncaster. Others were ready elsewhere. Labour’s Energy spokesman, Stan Orme, was trying