Seventy five years after women won the vote. around 15,000 people marched through London on 6 February in a demonstration organised by Women Against Pit Closures (WAPC).
Coming just a wook after publicaton of the Commons Trade and Industry Select Commitioe report, the theme of the Hyde Park raily which followed the demonstration was Not 31... not '..the reporte boxy, had proposed no pit closures* aseries of measures which would ghe 31 pits whilst accepting the closure of WAPC have denounced the report WAPC share the view of the NUM that the trade and industry select committee report is unacceptable. It does nothing to ease the burden of worry that women in so mining communities have carried sinoe the announcement of the pit clo said Syvia Pye, Nabonal Chair of WAPC.
With the exception of NUM leader, Arthur Scargit, the platform of spea kers was wholly women although overwhelmingly MPs or full-time trade A retreshing exception was the apBumsall striker, who, addressing the rally through an interpreter, described the appaling work ng conditions which gave rise to the eight-month long strike. She ended an emotional speech by leading the crowd in chants of The workers united will never be defeated".
Ann Scargit, arrested the previcus day for chaining hersolf, suffragette style, to the Department of Trade and Industry Ha, also received a warm reception when she was invited on a give from NUPE women to WAPC. from within the trade union and labour movement but failed to moblise the wider support or large numbers who joined the demonstrations against pit closures in the autumn.
Unless this support is revitalised. a momenum is in caper of beino lost, and a "compromise of the sort outined in the trade and industry soect committee report, is in danger of sapping throuch ing for a programme of industrial action early next month and initatives of this sort need to be broadened.
our pits