Originally Posted by Biped

Unlike Paperpuke's dad, my dad worked down the mines too. He told me exactly what lunatic and restrictive practices were in operation by the 'closed shop' union reps working the pits.

Tell me paperpuke . . . . what's a scab? What's a . . . . closed shop?

Quiet little boy, the adults are talking. Take your name-calling to the NAAFI

Originally Posted by Panic-in-Detroit

Are you suggesting the battle is lost, or too dificult to tackle?

The country is bankrupt largely because of ever increasing welfare expenditure, and millions of our population are inactive.

Shall we just continue paying tax to fund this, and at the same time cut defence, education, police etc because welfare spending is sacrosanct?

The country is bankrupt because the bank's got greedy(as they were allowed to by both colour governments). Fuck all to do with Benefit cheats, Polish immigrants Paedo's or anything else Daily Mail/Sun readers seem to think caused it.

Originally Posted by jagman

Thatcher had no choice but break the unions from that point onwards.

And in the process devastated whole communities, which are still suffering today as a result of her actions.

Black Buck One - Out

Originally Posted by Biped

Unlike Paperpuke's dad, my dad worked down the mines too. He told me exactly what lunatic and restrictive practices were in operation by the 'closed shop' union reps working the pits.

Tell me paperpuke . . . . what's a scab? What's a . . . . closed shop?

As much as that might be true, it isn't pertinent to industry of today.
The unions (outside the public sector) are largely a relic and toothless and aren't really a factor for new industries inthe UK.
There are no union problems in any of the mining operations here anymore

Originally Posted by jagman

As much as I despise the unions and what they have done to this country I am pretty much in agreement with you but you must factor in that in 1979 Scargill decided he was going to bring down the government in the name of socialism.
He openly siad as much, Thatcher had no choice but break the unions from that point onwards.

Originally Posted by BlackBuckOne

And in the process devastated whole communities, which are still suffering today as a result of her actions.

Black Buck One - Out

I fully agree, I have said many times that Thatcher went to far. I was commenting on unions responsibilty for events, not trying absolve Thatcher

Originally Posted by llech

We used to have thing's called Factories and Coal Mines they paid well regardless of Academic Qualifications was a smashing idea to get rid of soo many of them, an act of infinite foresight don't you think?

So So wise!!
Well done that man. Lets add a manufacturing industry, ship yards and agriculture now we have service industries that pay nowt

Originally Posted by jagman

As much as that might be true, it isn't pertinent to industry of today.
The unions (outside the public sector) are largely a relic and toothless and aren't really a factor for new industries inthe UK.
There are no union problems in any of the mining operations here anymore

what mining operations???

Originally Posted by taylortaylor

So So wise!!
Well done that man. Lets add a manufacturing industry, ship yards and agriculture now we have service industries that pay nowt

Not only that service industries tend to be part time job's too!

Originally Posted by jagman

As much as I despise the unions and what they have done to this country I am pretty much in agreement with you but you must factor in that in 1979 Scargill decided he was going to bring down the government in the name of socialism.
He openly siad as much, Thatcher had no choice but break the unions from that point onwards.

Scargill said it openly, but it was on the agenda a full 15 years before that.

Puke: You defend the indefensible to the point of defending anyone and anything that has ruined our economy and thus cost jobs, and anyone who tries to fix it gets a slagging off. Thatcher took on the destructive force of the unions who were destroying our global competitiveness and thus making entire industries worthless, but she's a bitch for putting those same strikers on the dole queue. You said Gordon Brown was (I'll PARAphrase) top bloke, even though he's spent all the money, plus hundreds of billions more, and still left the UK in recession, with all of us having to pick up the tab - you'll say it was the bankers of course, but the truth is, it was Gordon's 'light touch' regulation (or complete lack thereof) that allowed greedy bankers to mess things up.

When will you grow up and stop living this ideological marxist fantasy of yours? Your entire system of twisted ideals sank like a stone acros the world 20 years ago, and everywhere it's been tried it's resolutely failed to lift people from poverty; it's done the opposite, it's actually put more people into the poor house.

Edited to add: Jagman, I'm sure that's the case. From what I've been looking up, we certainly seem to have rebuilt capabilities (without the militancy) of our mining ops. There's less coal than people are assuming however - latest estimates show considerably less than 1 billion tons in the UK. Left in the ground, like gas, it will accrue a good deal more value than digging or sucking it up while there's still plenty about. Call it a longer term investment.

Originally Posted by jagman

As much as that might be true, it isn't pertinent to industry of today.
The unions (outside the public sector) are largely a relic and toothless and aren't really a factor for new industries inthe UK.
There are no union problems in any of the mining operations here anymore

Originally Posted by taylortaylor

what mining operations???

Alright, I shall bite and repeat myself.....

As I said on page one of this thread-

The UK currently produces over 7 million tonnes of coal from deep mining a year.
Cleveland Potash produce over a million tonnes a year plus half a million tonnes of salt, from deep mining
Carrickfergus and Salt Union produce massive quantities from deep mining
Western United are doing extensive develoment work in Cornwall and will be producing tin and copper amongst other things
Corus have several ironstone mines on care and maintenance which are viable if we can get our head around not paying them to produce elsewher in the world
The UK has serious Uranium reserves underground which could be of serious value to our future
British coal is cheaper than importd and has been for about 8 years now.
There are active gold mines in the UK
Southern Ireland deep mines lead, we have greater reserves here in the UK
We have zinc applently