March 3rd is the 25th anniversary of the ending of the Miners' Strike. The year long struggle was *the* defining moment of the last 30 years. Its defeat at the hands of the government ultimately allowed the Tories to carry through its neoliberal programme with all the devastating effects it has had on the labour movement, the manufacturing industry, rights at work and working class communities. Had the miners won Britain would be a very different place today, and perhaps neoliberalism not be as globally dominant as it has been in the years since the strike.
To commemorate the occasion The Forum Theatre in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent is hosting an evening of Question Time-style debate this Wednesday. The panel will feature Respect MP George Galloway, former Tory MP Edwina Currie, leftist filmmaker Ken Loach, a representative for local Labour MP Mark Fisher, and UKIP MEP Mike Nattrass. I suspect many former miners and the comrades from Women Against Pit Closures will be in attendance, as well as local Tories. The audience mix and the make up of the panel should mean the evening will be lively!
Because of the format the organisers ask questions be submitted in advance. They can be sent to info@theartbay.co.uk
There are some tickets left. They're £5 waged and £3 concessions and can be obtained from the Potteries Museum in Hanley, by phone at 01782 844222 or online here. Proceeds will be split between an adventure playground project in Newcastle-U-Lyme and Marie Curie.
The Miners' Strike Question Time will start at 7pm and finish by 9:30. So if you're in Stoke and interested in how the strike continues to shape the political landscape 25 years on, come along.
2 comments:
What local Tories? Apart from that cunt Shaun Bennett, I can't imagine any of them daring to show their faces.
Don't be so sure of that. There are 17 members of Stoke Central Tory Association!
I also remember going to the local launch of Veritas to see what Kilroy-Silk had to say a few years back. It was one of the weirdest meetings I've ever been to. Local racists and little englanders mixed with ex Labour voters and Thatcherites.
It was really dreadful.
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