Coalfield Communities

Debate between David T C Davies and Ian Lavery

Tuesday 28th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[David T. C. Davies]

My hon. Friend makes an important point, because one third of the miners continued to work throughout that strike and many more would have done so had they been able to. Of course it was not just the mining union and the miners themselves who were split on this; the whole trade union movement was split on it. The steelworkers did not particularly want the strike to go ahead and the shipworkers’ unions were not in favour of it; they were all happy to turn a blind eye to coal that was still being pulled out of the ground, and they knew that they had to, because if the steel furnaces had been allowed to run down, it would not just have been miners who lost their jobs but thousands of steelworkers. But none of that was important to Arthur Scargill; he was more than happy to risk the jobs of thousands of other working people, as well as those of the miners, to try to impose his will on a democratically elected Government who had just won a very large majority.

The hon. Member for Wansbeck (Ian Lavery), along with many others, criticised the police and asked whether we had ever had someone spit in our face. I have had someone spit in my face, and I have also been in violent situations as a serving police officer. I know that emotions can run high and that there can be inappropriate behaviour when people are suffering extreme provocation. All those thousands of people who turned up at the Orgreave cokeworks—and had been badly led—had been taken there to stop people working, in order to prevent coke from being delivered to the steelworks. Had they succeeded, they would have destroyed thousands of jobs.

[Ian Lavery]

I advise the hon. Gentleman not to cite something that I did not say. In certain circumstances, a police officer spat in my face when I was on the ground being restrained. The hon. Gentleman suggests that someone has spat in his face, but has a police officer ever spat in his face?

--- Later in debate ---

[David T. C. Davies]

Obviously, a police officer has never spat in my face. I am saying to the hon. Gentleman that there are occasions when police officers may behave badly, having suffered extreme provocation. There is one thing that it is very important to say: police officers do not go looking for trouble, looking for fights and looking to inflict violence; they want to go home every night. Frankly, they want a quiet life and they do not go around looking for trouble.

[Ian Lavery]

rose—

[David T. C. Davies]

I am willing to give way one more time because I respect the fact that at least this Labour Member knows something about the working classes, which is more than I can say for a lot of them.

[Ian Lavery]

Thanks again. I have to say, however, that a brother of mine is a police inspector, and there is a huge difference between the police force today and the one we experienced during the miners’ strike and then during the Hillsborough fiasco. By goodness, it is a good job, too.

[David T. C. Davies]

There are differences in respect of the police, the NUM, the Labour party and the Conservative party, but one thing is for certain: that was a political strike and it was not brought about by the then Government. They did not want a strike like that. The NUM, led by Arthur Scargill, had decided that it wanted to bring down the Government—that is an absolute fact—and he failed three times to persuade the miners to go with him so he took them out anyway, against their wishes.

I have two and a half minutes left, so let us talk about today, because we now have a different situation and a very different NUM. Its representatives came to give evidence to the Select Committee on Welsh Affairs and they were not singing the praises of Arthur Scargill. I believe the union has some sort of legal dispute with him at the moment. He hastened the end of an industry by making it clear to the Government that they would not be able to rely on coal to generate electricity, so it is not in the least bit surprising that they went ahead with the dash for gas and for nuclear—that was the only way they could be certain of keeping the lights on. It is a great shame that he hastened the end of the industry. Of course, some pits would have shut down, because some of them simply did not have any coal left, but a good leader of the miners at that time would have got public support by demanding better redundancy measures and better measures to help the coalfield communities get through what was going to be a very difficult time. Instead, he led them all out on a strike they did not want and did not support, and lost all public opinion. The resulting catastrophe for many miners is something we can lay entirely at his door and, interestingly, not one person here is wiling to defend him.

Housing Benefit

Debate between David T C Davies and Ian Lavery

Tuesday 12th November 2013 Commons Chamber

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

The debate this afternoon has alarmed me. I listened to the huge divide between the two sides here in the Palace of Westminster. I am amazed at some of the contributions. As a Labour representative and as a member of the public, I resent Members of Parliament saying that I am foolish and my colleagues are foolish because we disagree with them, when all we are doing is looking to support the most vulnerable people in society.

The hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) was outrageous in his comments. He attacked people in council houses because, he said, they lack ambition. That is so untrue. It is unbelievable. Some of the people in my constituency who live in council houses have lived there all their lives and for generations, and they have been working all their lives as well. So to think that people in council houses do not count, and that the council or anybody else can just come and move them on when they think there is a crisis, is outrageous.

This pernicious tax impacts on 600,000 people, of whom 400,000 are disabled. Some 375,000 children will suffer as a consequence of the tax. This is not about under-occupancy. It is not even about saving money, because the Government have admitted that they will not save as much as they had hoped. This is solely about Conservative ideology. It is about dogma. It is about throwing red meat to Back Benchers. It is about flexing powerful financial muscles. It is a class issue between those who have and those who have not. It is about people letting other people know where they are in the pecking order. That is what we have seen today.

[David T. C. Davies]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Lavery]

The hon. Gentleman seeks to intervene. I have never heard such outrageous comments as we heard in his contribution today in my three and half years in the House.

The bedroom tax will mean more child poverty and more people looking to pay off payday loans. There will be spiralling debt and people made homeless because of the bedroom tax. This is not simply about the bedroom tax. That is just a single part of the wider welfare reform, which the Government have seen falling down around their ears. The personal independence payment has huge problems. Universal credit has hit the buffers. There are problems with employment and support allowance, and hon. Members should look at the situation that Atos is causing, with, in the main, the same sort of people.

The people we are talking about today live in homes where they have lived all their lives in many cases. It is about time that people understood that. These are homes where people and children were brought up, where families lost their loved ones and where tears of joy and sadness have been shed.

[David T. C. Davies]

Crocodile tears.