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of the ‘Miners’ Wives Back to Work Campaign’, whose representatives came to see me at 10 Downing Street. I was moved by the courage of these women, whose families were subject to the abuse and intimidation. They told me a great deal and confirmed some of my suspicions about the NCB’s handling of the strike. They said that the majority of miners still did not understand the full extent of the NCB’s pay offer and plans for investment: more needed to be done to put across the NCB’s case to striking miners, many of whom relied on the NUM for their information. They confirmed that while talks between the NCB and the NUM were going on, or were in prospect, it was extremely difficult to persuade men to return to work. They explained to me how small shops in the coalfields were being blackmailed into supplying food and goods for striking miners and withholding them from working miners. But perhaps the most shocking thing they had to say was that local NCB management in some areas were not anxious to promote a return to work and in one particular area were actively siding with the NUM to discourage it. In this overunionized industry I found that all too likely.

Of course, the vital thing for these women was that the NCB should do everything it could to protect miners who had led the return to work, if necessary transferring them to pits where there were fewer militants and giving them priority in applications for redundancies. I said that we would not let them down, and I think I kept my word. The whole country was in their debt.

One working miner’s wife, Mrs McGibbon from Kent, spoke at the Conservative Party Conference, describing the harrowing experiences which she and her family had undergone. The vile tactics of the strikers knew no limit. Even her small children were targets: they were told that their parents were going to be killed. Shortly after she had spoken the Morning Star published her address. A week later her home was attacked.

On 11 September the National Working Miners’ Committee was formed. This was an important development in the history of the working miners’ movement. I heard a good deal informally about what was happening on the ground through David Hart, a friend who was making great efforts to help the working miners. I was eager to learn everything I could.

On Wednesday 26 September I went to York. I visited the Minster, which had recently been struck by lightning and badly damaged in the fire which followed — divine punishment, some suggested, for the wayward theology of leading Anglican clerics. I also discussed with the Yorkshire police and local people the damage the strike was doing to the local community. At lunch with Conservative Party activists, some of those from Barnsley confirmed the impression that we had received throughout the strike: that the NCB’s publicity of its case was truly dreadful. There were, too, the accounts of intimidation with which I had become all too familiar. Nor could one doubt the economic hardship which Mr Scargill’s obduracy was imposing on his own supporters. I was told that miners were digging up rootcrops from the fields to feed themselves and their families.

One positive result of the visit was my meeting with Michael Eaton, Director of the NCB’s North Yorkshire area and the man who had developed the new pit at Selby.

I heard again in York, as I had from advisers previously, how effective he was. He has a wonderful soft Yorkshire voice and a good way of explaining things, so I suggested his appointment as a national spokesman to help improve NCB’s presentation. Mr Eaton did a fine job, though unfortunately his position was made difficult as a result of jealousy and obstruction elsewhere in the NCB’s ranks.

Meanwhile the threat from NACODS crept up on us. The leadership of NACODS was now clearly intent on a strike and announced that a strike ballot was to be held on 28 September. An agreement on the outstanding issues seemed within reach at one point but was repudiated by the union president on his return from holiday. At first the NCB was optimistic about the