The Kent Miners' Association was a

trade union A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and benefits ( ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

which existed between 1915 and 1945, representing

coal miners People have worked as coal miners for centuries, but they became increasingly important during the Industrial revolution when coal was burnt on a large scale to fuel stationary and locomotive engines and heat buildings. Owing to coal's strategic ro ...

in the county of

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

. After 1945 it was reorganised as the Kent Area of the National Union of Mineworkers.

Early history

Coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

was discovered in

in the late-19th century, but extraction did not begin until 1912.Nigel Yates, ''Kent in the Twentieth Century'', pp.30-35 The Kent Miners Association was established in 1915, and immediately affiliated to the

Miners' Federation of Great Britain The Miners' Federation of Great Britain (MFGB) was established after a meeting of local mining trade unions in Newport, Wales in 1888. The federation was formed to represent and co-ordinate the affairs of local and regional miners' unions in Engla ...

.Arthur Marsh and Victoria Ryan, ''Historical Directory of Trade Unions'', pp.221-222 Working conditions in the mines were poor, and mine owners struggled to attract workers, giving a strong bargaining position to the union. In 1941, a dispute emerged over additional payments for working a particularly difficult seam. Official arbitration backed the mineowners, prompting more than 4,000 coal miners to strike, despite a wartime ban on industrial action. The government responded by arresting 1,000 miners and imprisoning three union officials with hard labour, but when only nine workers paid their fines, the government was forced to negotiate with the gaoled union leaders who were released after eleven days and the fines waived. The union became the Kent Area of the National Union of Mineworkers in 1945, by which time, membership had reached 5,100. In 1961, 160 workers at

Betteshanger Betteshanger is a village near Deal in East Kent, England. It gave its name to the largest of the four chief collieries of the Kent coalfield. The population of the village is included in the civil parish of Northbourne. Before the coal mine ...

were served with redundancy notices. A stay-down strike was launched, which succeeded in persuading the

National Coal Board The National Coal Board (NCB) was the statutory corporation created to run the nationalised coal mining industry in the United Kingdom. Set up under the Coal Industry Nationalisation Act 1946, it took over the United Kingdom's collieries on "v ...

to open a new seam, allowing the workforce to remain at the same level.

1984-85 Strike

One pit closed in 1969, and two more were listed for closure in 1981. The area was strongly supportive of the UK miners' strike of 1984-1985. The Kent miners were successful in raising funds from sympathetic socialists in London and from trade unions in continental Europe, which allowed the Kent strikers to maintain a higher standard of living that those in other parts of Britain and generated some resentment. Malcolm Pitt, the area president, was jailed for allegedly breaching bail conditions, and suspected miners were turned back at the

Dartford Tunnel The Dartford-Thurrock River Crossing, commonly known as the Dartford Crossing and until 1991 the Dartford Tunnel, is a major road crossing of the River Thames in England, carrying the A282 road between Dartford in Kent in the south and Thurro ...

to prevent picketing. The Kent NUM applied for an injunction against use of this power. Sir Michael Havers initially denied this application outright, but Mr. Justice Skinner later ruled that this power of the police may only be used if the anticipated breach of the peace were "in close proximity both in time and place". Kent NUM leader Jack Collins said after the decision of the NUM conference in March 1985 to end the strike without an amnesty for those sacked during the dispute, "The people who have decided to go back to work and leave men on the sidelines are traitors to the trade-union movement." The Kent NUM organised a continuation of picketing across the country, which delayed the return to work at many pits for another two weeks. Arthur Scargill himself was turned back at the gates of

Barrow Colliery Barrow Colliery was a coal mine in Worsborough, South Yorkshire, England. It was first dug in 1873, with the first coal being brought to the surface in January 1876. It was the scene of a major incident in 1907 when seven miners died. After 109 ...

Worsborough Worsbrough is an area about two miles south of Barnsley in the metropolitan borough of Barnsley, South Yorkshire, England. Before 1974, Worsbrough had its own urban district council in the West Riding of the historic county of Yorkshire and i ...

when he tried to lead the miners back to work. There were only 32

strikebreaker A strikebreaker (sometimes called a scab, blackleg, or knobstick) is a person who works despite a strike. Strikebreakers are usually individuals who were not employed by the company before the trade union dispute but hired after or during the st ...

s in Kent in the 1984-85 strike, and they were subject to so many attacks on their person and property that they had all left the industry by April 1986. The last coal mine closed in 1989.

General Secretaries

:1915: W. H. Varley :1919: H. Hartley :1920s: John Elks :1948: Jack Johnson :1960: Jack Dunn :1970s: Jack Collins

References

{{National Union of Mineworkers (UK) Trade unions established in 1915 Mining trade unions National Union of Mineworkers (Great Britain) Politics of Kent Mining in Kent 1915 establishments in England Trade unions based in Kent